


Where the Other Losers Live

by remiges



Series: Fly By Night [1]
Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, Career Ending Injuries, Casual Sex, Developing Relationship, Estrangement, Fuckbuddies to More, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Misunderstandings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-25
Updated: 2017-07-25
Packaged: 2018-12-06 23:39:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 25,362
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11611368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/remiges/pseuds/remiges
Summary: Claude slides out from between the sheets and starts putting on his clothes. "You better take me someplace nice," he says, poking a finger in Sid's face. "I got a reputation to uphold.""Yeah," Sid says, and Claude can see the glint of his teeth in the dark as he smiles. "Fast and loose?"Claude snorts and shoves his feet into his shoes. "Watch who you're calling loose," he says, and lets himself out without bothering to lock the door behind him.





	Where the Other Losers Live

**Author's Note:**

> Title from one of my favorite poems, ["When at a Certain Party in NYC"](http://www.32poems.com/issues/erin-belieu) by Erin Belieu.

Claude wakes up to his alarm clock blinking. He lies there for a moment, waiting for the flashing red numbers to start making sense, before swearing and throwing the covers off.

"Shit, shit, fuck," he mutters, skidding into the hallway and tripping over a pile of clothes that someone—Carson, probably, or maybe Cameron—left there for no apparent reason. He runs into Danny in the kitchen, literally body checking him into the counter.

"Jesus," Danny swears as he slops something all over Claude's front.

"Ouch," Claude hisses, but it's a reflex since the water isn't hot. He peers at the clock on the microwave. 6:43, thank fuck.

"Sorry," he says, grabbing a towel off the counter and dropping it on the floor, mopping up the spill by dragging the towel around with his foot. "Thought I was late. There's something wrong with my clock."

"The power was out again," Danny tells him as he fills his mug back up and sticks it in the microwave. "Sorry, I would have woken you up later."

"It's fine," Claude says, now that his heart rate is back to something approaching normal. He watches as Danny tries to work the number pad, but the microwave keeps putting a succession of eights on the screen, no matter what button he pushes.

Danny whacks it a couple of times, but nothing changes. "Damn thing's possessed," he mutters as he clears the display and starts it for eighty-eight seconds.

"When it starts spitting out sixes, then it'll be time to worry," Claude says as he watches the mug revolve. "Am I taking the boys to school or are you?"

"You are," Danny says after a pause that's just a little long.

Claude is not caffeinated enough to deal with this.

"No take backs," Danny says too fast, and Claude doesn’t have a chance to argue before Cameron and Carson wander in and start bickering over who gets to eat the last of the Marshmallow Mateys.

Danny grins when Claude glares at him, and then it's business as usual. Cameron's freaking out about his science project proposal, which he swears he printed off at the library but can't find, and Carson tries to leave in flip flops even though the vice principal had called Danny the last two time he showed up in inappropriate footwear, and Caelan _still_ isn't ready, and in fact isn't even out of bed.

In between the chaos of getting ready for work and making sure that everyone has what they need for school, Claude thinks back to the extra couple of minutes he could have spent sleeping and decides that he might become religious just so he has a god to curse for times like these.

Danny waves languidly from his place at the table as the boys squabble for who gets shotgun, and Claude flips him off companionably before grabbing his keys off the counter.

He's dropped off the boys and is halfway across town before he reaches for his instant coffee and realizes that he never made the damn thing, and that his mug of water is probably still sitting in the microwave, getting colder as he drives.

All in all, Claude's had worse days, but he's certainly had better ones.

***

Claude's life goes a little like this: work, Danny and the boys, the bar, more work, hanging out with Wayne. The last time he remembers checking the calendar it had been March, and now it's halfway through August.

Claude would regret the missing time if there was actually anything worth missing.

***

"So," says a guy in a boxy suit, tie loosened in a way that would probably be attractive if it didn't also bare his scraggly chest hair. "What do you do?"

He raises a two fingers for the bartender, and Claude nods his thanks. "Oh," he purrs, smirking over the side of his glass, "I do everything."

They end up in the handicap stall, Claude hanging on to the top of the door, the whole thing rattling as the guy fucks into him in jerks. He's panting into the back of Claude's neck in a way that's too loud and definitely too wet.

Claude grits his teeth against the burn and tries to ignore the way the guy is groaning. He focuses instead on the weight and the heat, the body pressed against his, but that only goes so far. Neither one of them have undressed past pushing their pants down.

The real estate agent, or whatever he'd said he was, sinks his teeth into Claude's shoulder and gives him a reach around, and Claude closes his eyes against the graffiti his hands aren't covering.

When he comes, it's on a whimper that doesn't actually leave his throat.

"Here," says the guy as he passes Claude a wad of toilet paper to clean off with. He dumps the condom in the toilet, and Claude winces at the thought of whatever plumbing that's going to fuck up.

The toilet paper is disintegrating against his skin and Claude's still a little wobbly from coming, so he leans against the stall and lets the other guy leave first. He tries to ignore how the metal feels tacky against the skin not covered by his tank top.

***

"Are you going to get that?" Danny asks as Claude's phone buzzes on the counter.

"Nope," he says, squinting at the recipe for curry he'd gotten off the internet. "Hospital won't stop calling."

"You sure it's not important?" The noise takes on a metallic tone as the phone vibrates onto the stove.

Claude snorts. "It's more bullshit with Marlene." He drops a bouillon cube into the pot and stirs with prejudice.

"Ah," Danny says, and Claude waits for the phone to stop ringing, like if he doesn't acknowledge the noise he won't have to deal with it.

"Her doctors want me to come in for a donor match or something," Claude says, even though Danny hadn't asked and he doesn't really feel like talking about it, anyways. "They think that just because we're related she's obliged to any part of me."

The curry in the pot bubbles and Claude keeps stirring, feeling it stick to the bottom of the pot. Danny leans against the edge of the counter and the whole thing creaks ominously.

"Are you going?"

There's nothing in his voice indicating what he thinks Claude should do about his deadbeat mother, who he hasn't even talked to in… over a decade, if he's doing the math right. Fourteen years, something like that? She'd dropped out of his life like a stone into a empty lake, and if Claude's being honest with himself, it was the best thing that's ever happened to him.

The thought of seeing her again makes him feel vaguely nauseous, but that still doesn't mean he knows what he's going to do.

He doesn't answer, and Danny takes the spoon from him when the curry starts spitting, flips off the burner and pushes him in the direction of the kitchen table.

"Well if you do, get someone to take a look at your knee, yeah?" Danny says, like that's something Claude's ever going to voluntarily do when they're just going to tell him the same thing they did the last time, and the time before that. It's not like working part-time at the library covers his insurance, anyways.

"Can't," Claude says, swiping crumbs from Cameron's place onto the floor. "I'm scheduled to work a double to make up for the last time I missed work to deal with Marlene's shit. Already used up all my sick days."

Danny hums, digs out a potholder and sets the curry down on the counter. The wood groans in protest at the weight and the laminate that's come loose from the corner lifts up slightly.

"Something will turn up," he says, and Claude hates how he can say that, how everything can always be _okay_ for him in a way that Claude has never managed to master. He wants this to be over, wants everything to be resolved, wants the entire messy business to be a distant memory.

"Yeah," he says, and stares at the curry steaming slightly on the counter until Danny yells for the boys to come eat.

***

"So," says the guy to Claude's left, leaning up against the bar like he's the only thing supporting it. "You come here often?"

Claude looks him over. He's big and brawny, the kind of man who could bend Claude over and make him take it.

"Sure," Claude says and tosses back his drink. "I go other places, too." He winks, and that's really all it takes.

They end up in the back alley and it isn't even that good of a fuck. The guy's beard smells a little weird when he kisses Claude, and he uses too much spit, like that can make up for the lack of technique.

When he drops to his knees, he uses a little too much teeth, but his mouth is warm and he can deepthroat, and that's really all Claude needs.

Claude gives him a handjob in return before pulling his pants back up. They'd ended up around his ankles, and he tries to shake off the grime before giving it up as a lost cause.

"See you around sometime," the guy says, and Claude just waves. It's probably stupid to hook up like this, but the rest of his life is so incredibly static. He just wants something that'll make him feel, even if it's only for a little while, even if it's reckless.

Claude doesn't feel like going back to the bar, so he stands there for a minute, trying to get his breathing under control as the noise from the bar spills out across the pavement. He looks up, but if there are stars they're hidden behind the cloud cover.

***

"I just," Claude says, working on cutting the rest of the Very Hungry Caterpillars out of the construction paper spread across the table in Wayne's apartment.

"You just what?" Wayne asks. He's busy penciling in lines on the wood he'd gotten for the bookshelf he's building. They're calling it Craft Night and drinking the Schenns' shitty Natty Lights, and Claude's trying to ignore how the name makes it sound like they're eighty years old and into knitting.

"I just want to find someone who has money and wants to give it to me," Claude sighs as he accidentally snips part of an antenna off. "You know, like someone who will cover me in diamonds or buy me a yacht or something."

"You want a sugar daddy," Wayne says, and even without looking at him Claude knows he's not impressed. "You. A sugar daddy."

"Hey, I could totally pull a sugar daddy," Claude protests, flipping a bit of scrap paper at him. It flutters to the floor, and Wayne's expression doesn't change. "But really, do you know any rich old guys who are looking to die soon?"

Wayne snorts. "If I did, I wouldn't be sending them your way. And what's wrong with your _amour_?"

"Not back yet," Claude says, before realizing the trap he'd just walked into. He starts backpedaling. "And he's not my _amour_ , he's a dedicated fuck buddy."

Wayne rolls his eyes.

"Exactly." Claude starts lifting his piles of construction paper. "Have you seen my glitter?"

"No way," Wayne says, pointing a hammer at him threateningly. "There's no way you're doing that in here. I was finding glitter for like two months the last time."

"I'll be careful," Claude says. He spots the container behind a box of nails and holds it up in triumph.

Wayne plucks it out of his hand.

"Hey, give that back. Wayne. _Wayne_ ," Claude says as he gets faked out. "Think of the children!"

Their ensuing tussle ends with the glitter spilled across the carpet, but Claude thinks he's probably won that round.

***

"So," says a guy with a mohawk. "What are you drinking, sugar?"

Claude grins up at him and lets his legs splay open on his stool. "That depends. What are you buying?"

They end up at the guy's—Ryan's—place, just a short walk from the bar. They don't even make it to the bedroom, fumbling on the living room couch like teenagers. He sucks Claude off, wet and messy, and lets Claude pull his hair when he comes.

"Harder," he says as Claude is jerking him off. Claude obliges, closes his eyes and lets the faint smell of weed drift over him, tightens his fist and tries to block out everything else but the slide of flesh on flesh.

He has to get a book display together for the YA section since Cindy's on maternity leave, and see if he can remember how to do things with polynomials for Carson's math class, and they either need to get a new vacuum or send the one they currently have to the shop, and the hospital called again—

Ryan stiffens and comes, and Claude opens his eyes to the present.

He picks up his baseball cap from the floor and crams it back on his head, washes his hands in the kitchen sink with the water pouring over the dirty dishes, and leaves after sketching a wave at Ryan. It's just possible, he thinks, that his life isn't supposed to be like this.

***

"Excuse me," an elderly man says, approaching the checkout counter. "Can you help me with the computer? It says I have to put in my password, but I don't have one."

Claude sticks a smile on his face, but he knows exactly how this conversation is going to go. "Absolutely. Now, what are you after?" he asks, leading the man back to the computer lab.

"I've got these benefits I'm supposed to get," he says, and by the time Claude walks him through the process and tells him that no, none of the librarians can help input his actual information because of library policy, he's exhausted.

When he gets back to the counter, Judy is examining the side of a book with an expression of faint horror on her face before gingerly opening the cover of another one.

Claude really doesn't want to know.

"Hey, Claude," he hears, and turns around to see Danny and two of the boys. Caelan's standing a couple of feet away like he's embarrassed to be seen with them, and Carson's got a couple of books tucked under his arm.

"Hey," Claude says as he passes back through the swinging doors. "Why aren't you guys in school?"

"Dryer fire at the high school," Danny says, scrubbing a hand through his hair. "They sent them home."

Claude looks everyone over, but Danny looks the most distressed. The boys seem unfazed.

"I thought you guys were going to get video games soon," Caelan says, craning his neck to see behind the counter. All they've got back there is the holds shelf, the cash register, and Mike the security guard who's looking though the paper.

"Caelan," Danny says, but Claude can tell his heart's not in it. "And put your shoe back on," he tells Carson, who's taken his foot out of his sneaker and is rolling his ankle around. "Look, can you take them home at the end of your shift? I've got to get back to work."

"It's not like we can't take care of ourselves," Caelan mutters.

"I can't take you all the way across town and still make it back to work in time," Danny says, looking harried. "Staying here a couple of hours won't kill you. I'm going to be late as it is."

"Linda in children's is always happy to see you," Claude says, but Caelan just huffs.

 _Sorry_ , Danny mouths at him, and then he's gone, digging out his keys as he goes. Claude looks at the boys, then at the man at the counter who's got the maximum number of DVDs he can check out, then at the clock. He needs a drink.

***

"So," Claude hears as someone slides into the seat next to him. "You're still drinking that shit?"

Claude chokes on his beer. Sid grins, unrepentant, and tosses a handful of napkins at him.

"Thought you had that hockey thing? The underprivileged kids or whatever," Claude gets out when he's not in danger of drowning on his own drink.

"You keeping track of me now?" Sid asks, and Claude doesn't tell him that he's the biggest thing to ever happen to this town and that the gossip mill never actually stops running. "Already over."

Sid looks good, hair falling over his forehead and a spark in his eyes. He raises a hand to signal the bartender, and Claude is caught on the curve of his forearm, his sleeves rolled up in the hot press of the room.

"Well, aren't you lucky," Claude says. "I know how much you hate small children."

Sid smiles his thanks at the bartender, who slides something that's probably shitty over. Even after being a literal celebrity, Sid still doesn't drink anything good.

"What's been happening?" he asks, taking a sip, and Claude has to drag his eyes away from the way Sid's adam's apple bobs as he swallows. "Anything new?" If Claude wanted, he could tell him about the church that got pulled down off Main Street because of asbestos, the splash pad the community center just poured the cement for, the new wind farm the town's been fighting for the last four months.

He could, but he won't. They aren't those kinds of people, the kinds who trade small talk and compliments, who tell each other about their day. Claude's a good fuck, he knows he is, and Sid likes routines. That's all this really is.

Sid seems to know it too, because he drinks whatever's in his glass fast.

"Same old, same old." Claude drawls, tracing a finger through the condensation on his almost empty bottle. "Now, your place or mine?" It's rhetorical. Sid has never actually been to Claude's house, but the question is tradition, dating back to the first time Claude had picked him up in this bar.

"Pretty presumptuous, don't you think?" Sid asks, eyes half-lidded.

"Crosby," Claude says, and leans in close like he's telling a secret, catching a whiff of Sid's cologne as he does. He puts his mouth right up against his ear and hears Sid's breath hitch as he whispers, "Everyone knows you're easy."

He smirks as he straightens up, and doesn't look behind him as he starts for the exit.

***

Here's the thing: Claude knows he's just a seasonal distraction, and he's perfectly fine with it. The sex is fantastic, and honestly he's done worse things for better reasons. He won't go to the papers with all the salacious details—not that there are details, or that the news cycle would care this many years later—and Sid's a good lay. Claude knows exactly what this is.

***

They fumble their way through Sid's front door, and Claude pushes him back against the wall as soon as they're inside.

"Miss me?" Sid pants as he starts tugging at Claude's shirt. He tangles a hand in Claude's hair, and Claude nips the inside of his arm for his trouble.

"I missed something, all right," he says, grabbing Sid's crotch. He's already hard, which is gratifying.

They make their way to the bedroom, shedding clothes as they go. Claude trips over a trailing corner of the bedspread and almost ends up on the ground, but Sid grabs him.

"Graceful," he says, then squawks as Claude drags him down onto the bed.

"Yeah, it's my middle name," Claude says, and then he finds something better to do with his mouth.

***

"Don't you ever get bored?" Sid asks after, dragging him back from the edge of dozing off.

Claude stares at him.

"I mean," Sid continues, fingers trailing over the stitched patterns of his bedspread, "what we're doing, what we _have_ been doing, is great, but don't you ever want something… more?"

Claude keeps staring.

"Like, all we do is fuck, which is fine. But I just, I want—" Sid trails off.

"You want to, what, date?" Claude manages to get out. It's hard to make out Sid's expression with the shadows curled around them both, but Claude squints like that will make Sid's face come into sharper focus, or his words start making sense.

"Not date," Sid says after a pause that's a hair too long. "Just, we could do things that aren't fuck, right?"

"Yes?" Claude says, but that's still doesn't answer anything. Claude's convenient, that's all there is to it. Why Sid wants to shake up a good thing is beyond him.

"I don't mean any big thing," Sid is saying when Claude tunes back in. " I just… I'm never anywhere. Not really." Claude doesn't tell him how that doesn't make any sense, that Sid is always everywhere, that he has all of these options.

"Just, think about it, yeah?" Sid says, and he sounds worn down, like this is the last in the line of things he's had to ask for and not gotten.

It's dark in the room, night settling in, but there's enough light that it's giving everything a strange, surreal quality. Maybe that's why Claude doesn't laugh him off.

"Fine," he says, hardly believing the words coming out of his mouth. "Pick me up at six." Claude slides out from between the sheets and starts putting on his clothes. "You better take me someplace nice," he says, poking a finger in Sid's face. "I got a reputation to uphold."

"Yeah," Sid says, and Claude can see the glint of his teeth as he smiles. "Fast and loose?"

Claude snorts and shoves his feet into his shoes, which had ended up beneath Sid's dresser. "Watch who you're calling loose," he says, and lets himself out without bothering to lock the door behind him.

***

The following day passes in a blur, and it seems like only an instant has passed between Claude stamping his timecard and arriving home. He ditches his work clothes and dithers over what to wear for a minute before remembering how stupid that is. Sid once fucked him when he was wearing leg warmers—he's not going to care.

Still, he figures he'll put on something nice-ish in case Sid drags him somewhere fancy.

"Danny," he calls, walking out of his room. "Have you seen my belt?"

The boys are sitting on the couch, playing something on the TV, and they all look up when he enters the living room.

"Wow, Claude!" Carson gasps theatrically. "Where are you going?"

"Yeah," Caelan snickers. "The eighties called and they want their shirt back."

Claude squints down at his sweater. It's a bit orange, but the pattern's not bad.

"Danny," he calls again as the boys crack themselves up. "Belt?"

"I think it's on the washing machine," he hears, and goes off to investigate.

Claude navigates around the backpack Caelan left lying in the middle of the hallway for some reason, and finds Danny already digging through the pile of clean clothes on top of the machine. Claude catches a layer of shirts as they start to slide off, but a couple of socks make it to the floor.

Danny emerges victorious with the belt and does a double take when catches sight of him. "Are you going on a date?" he asks. Claude feels vaguely offended at how high his eyebrows go. "With who?"

Claude shrugs. "It's not a date," he says as he takes the belt and starts threading it through his belt loops. "It's just Sid."

Danny smirks, but he still looks a little confused. "Well, have a good time. Don't do anything I wouldn't do."

Claude rolls his eyes. "Yeah, yeah."

He sits on the couch with the boys, idly watching their game, and tries to keep himself from watching the numbers on the VCR clock tick over. It's not like this is some huge thing—not like he's just getting to know someone and needs to make a good first impression. It's not like this is even a real date, but he can feel some nerves creep in anyways.

By the time Sid pulls up, Claude is thoroughly exasperated with himself.

Sid is in the same terrible SUV he's always driving, the outside covered in mud, and Cameron raises an eyebrow at Claude. At least, he attempts to. His face kind of scrunches, anyways.

"Not a word," Claude warns, and walks out the front door with a wave.

Claude has never invited Sid back to his place. Not because he's ashamed of it or anything, though it's nothing like the house that Sid owns on the other side of town. The boys are always there, and Danny would ask too many questions, and anyways, Sid's place is nicer. That's all it is.

That and they don't really do much besides fuck, and Danny and the boys are always hanging around.

"I like the lawn ornaments," Sid says as they pull out, and Claude snorts. There are a couple of gnomes near the side of the house, chosen by the boys specifically for how ugly they were.

"I think Danny would pay you to run over them," he says, and then starts flipping through the radio stations. He settles on a country station that's playing oldies, and they spend the rest of the drive in companionable silence.

It should be awkward, Claude thinks, but it isn't. He's not sure what he'd been so worried about, now that the reality is here. They've been fucking for a couple months each year for the past three years—it's not like they're strangers.

Still, in all that time Sid has never been out with him in public for any extended period.

It's not intentional, probably. Or, at least it doesn't have anything to do with Claude. It's just that Sid hates attention, even if there's not as much as there used to be. He signs autographs and smiles for selfies and shakes people's hands, but he always seems slightly hunted. He'll field the same questions, again and again, about his injury and how it feels to be out of the game, how he probably misses the spotlight.

Claude knows he doesn't, but Sid's admirers don't ask him.

But, he thinks as Sid puts on his turn signal and pulls into the turnoff lane for the shopping plaza, it could be worse. For all that he's famous, it's been a good four, five years since Sid had left the league. The media has moved on, except for whatever biopic piece gets written around either the time of the last game he'd played or the hit that started his downward spiral.

Claude gets pulled out of his thoughts when Sid parks the car. Claude had known the traveling carnival was going to be in town, but he'd forgotten it was this week. They've set up in the middle of the Walmart parking lot, complete with Ferris wheel, spinning wall, and food vendors.

"I wouldn't have expected you to be into these death traps," Claude says, but he's grinning as he undoes his seat belt.

"Live dangerously, that's my motto," Sid says, and Claude laughs in his face.

"Sure, Mr. Superstitious."

"Well, I'm a changed man," he says as they walk towards the ticket booth. They bicker companionably about what to ride first before deciding on the Ferris wheel, and if Claude knocks on the metal carriage before he gets in, well. Sid's doesn't have a moratorium on superstitions.

"So, why here?" Claude asks as they're on their way up, the bored attendant helping more couples in the ride.

Sid shrugs. "No one really expects me to be here."

He's right, Claude thinks. He can pull his cap down over his eyes and pretend he wasn't famous once. He can just be normal.

Then Sid grins. "That, and I've never been to one of these things before. I had to make sure I wasn't missing anything, eh?"

"The world at his fingertips," Claude mutters loud enough for Sid to hear, "and he wants to go to the traveling carnival."

They reach the top, and if this were a date Sid would kiss him here. If this were a movie, it would be darker and Claude would be able to see all of the lights scattered below.

Neither of those things happen. Instead, Claude just looks out over the sea of cars, the sound of traffic filtering through the muggy air, and grabs onto the rail as the carriage sways.

"Well, is it everything you thought it would be?" he asks as the couple below them starts making out frantically.

"I'll tell you when I figure it out," Sid says, and then the ride starts in earnest.

The wheel goes around twice, slower than Claude had been expecting, before they disembark. Back on the main thoroughfare Sid buys them food that is massively overpriced, but it's hot and greasy and that's all Claude cares about right now.

"Did you know the first Ferris wheel debuted at the Chicago World Fair?" Sid asks as they're walking towards the flying chairs.

"Nerd," Claude says, bumping their arms together so Sid's bite of funnel cake smears powered sugar over his nose instead of ending up in his mouth.

"Asshole," Sid says, and Claude doesn't try too hard to evade him when he steals some of Claude's giant pretzel.

***

"I thought that little kid was going to barf all over you," Claude laughs as they walk out the exit for the spinning wall. "He was like—"

Then he actually glances over at Sid.

"Oh, hey," Claude says, alarmed. Sid is looking rather green, an expression Claude hadn't gotten before this moment. "Why don't we sit down?"

Claude looks around for a bench before remembering they're in the middle of a parking lot and kicks himself. He doesn't want to make Sid sit on the pavement, but he will if it means avoiding him throwing up or passing out.

Before he has to make that choice, he spots a light post with a concrete base that looks like it'll work as emergency seating. He steers Sid over to it and sits down next to him, awkwardly perching on the edge to avoid the bubblegum someone had stuck there.

"Sorry, I forgot," he says. Of course Sid probably didn't want to go on any spinning rides, not with his head. It's been years since the string of concussions that took him out of the game, and he doesn't have the symptoms he used to, but still. Claude should have been thinking about that.

"Wait here," he tell him, and runs to buy a bottle of water that costs about as much as his car. After sipping is slowly for a while, Sid looks a little less likely to vomit.

"I'm fine," Sid says, and Claude doesn't say that he doesn't believe him, but his face must be making a pretty convincing case. "Really. And it's not my head. I just…" he trails off, looking tired. "I just shouldn’t have eaten before going on it."

Claude doesn't point out that he'd eaten his funnel cake some time ago, and they sit there on the cement for a while, the smell of popcorn drifting over as the air grows colder.

"So much for your outing," Claude says, watching as people meander around. The calypso music from the carousel winds down, then starts back up again.

"I don't know. It was good up until the end." His face is illuminated by the flashing lights from one of the rides, and Claude watches the way it turns his skin different colors. "This was something new. And," he says looking over at Claude, "the night's still young."

"Yeah?" Claude says. His throat clicks when he swallows, and he suddenly realizes how little space there is between their bodies. "You sure you aren't going to puke still?"

"Positive," Sid says—purrs, really—and puts his hand up high on Claude's thigh.

They leave rather quickly after that.

Back at Sid's place, after Claude starts to make fun of Sid for the mood lighting in the bedroom, then remembers Sid's concussion and can't quite find a way to recover that doesn't make him sound like a huge jackass, they end up in bed.

It takes some effort to undo all of the buttons on Sid's shirt since Claude's hands aren't very steady for some reason, but finally he gets it off. He hadn't known Sid when he was playing hockey, but he's still got muscles even now. He rubs a finger over a nipple and listens to Sid's breath catch.

"So," he murmurs as he pushes Sid back onto the mattress and straddles him. "Are you the kind of guy who puts out on the first date?"

"I don't know," Sid says, untucking Claude's shirt and sliding his hands along his spine. "Depends on how persuasive you are."

Claude is very persuasive.

"Look," Sid says after they've gone for round two and the sheets are all over the floor. Claude glances up from where he'd been tracing the indents his teeth had made in Sid's hip.

"I know you think this is stupid, but…" Sid trails off here, and Claude levers himself up on his elbow to watch his face. It's all shadows, though, and Sid doesn't seem like he knows how to finish the sentence.

"What?" Claude asks.

Sid hesitates, or maybe it's just the darkness that makes everything drag out, because he sounds normal when he says, "Nothing. It's nothing. Just, you get to pick the next one."

Claude could say no, tell Sid that they should stop wasting time and energy that could be used on fucking instead, but it was nice. Getting out, doing something he normally wouldn't have bothered with, having some company… It was nice.

"Sure," Claude says as he starts fishing around for his pants. "Thursday work for you?"

Sid nods, and apparently that's that. Claude's got another pseudo-date to go on, no idea what to do, and no disposable income to do it with. He grins.

"I'm gonna blow your mind, Crosby," he calls behind him as he shrugs his shirt on and opens the bedroom door. He leaves Sid there, splayed out across his giant bed, the covers dragging on the floor, caught in the light from the hallway.

***

"Claude," someone calls, and Claude looks up from the books he's scanning in. There's no one there, just a patron browsing through the display of classic sci-fi who's not paying him any attention.

"Claude," comes the voice again, and Claude leans over the counter. There's a little girl holding a stack of Bill Peet books staring up at him.

"Bobbi, hi." Claude looks around for her mother. She sitting on one of the benches in the middle of the atrium, close enough to keep an eye on her daughter but far enough away to give her the illusion of freedom.

"You want those checked out?" he asks, coming around the swinging doors so he can get on her level. "I like your hair. Did your mom help with that?"

"No, my dad did it for me," she says, shaking her head so the balls tied at the ends of her cornrows clatter together. "And I already checked out. I wanted to ask if Sidney Crosby was coming to the festival!"

"You know what, that's a while away, but I bet he'd like it if you wrote him a letter," Claude says, already thinking about the hints he can drop to get Sid to give the Lewis family a visit. Sid loves kids, but Claude's willing to sweeten the deal if that's what it takes.

"But he'll come?" Bobbi says, looking at him seriously.

"Well," Claude stall, and shoots a slightly frantic look at Bobbi's mother, who just shrugs back. "You know, Sid's pretty busy around that time, so he might not be able to make it."

Bobbi's excitement level doesn't actually change.

God, Claude can't crush her dreams. "But," he continues, rallying valiantly, "I'll see what I can do."

Her whole face lights up, and Claude smiles helplessly back. If Sid disappoints her, he might just kill him. Maybe he can get Sid in to read for the children's program, because that would be both hilarious and adorable.

He's still thinking about Bobbi's request when he shows up at Sid's house. Sid never sticks around for longer than postcard season, as Carson—or maybe Cameron, he can't remember—had dubbed it: the span of time between the leaves starting to turn colors and falling. That means he won't be around for the winter festival the library does, but there's no reason he can't come in before that.

"Hey," he says when Sid's folded into Claude's rust bucket of a car. "You want to come to the library some time, meet some of the kids? There's this one little girl who loves you, and it'd make her day if she could meet you."

"Sure," Sid says. From what Claude can tell, it's pretty rare that children as young as Bobbi idolize Sid, what with the Great Eight tearing it up on the ice. Sid doesn't even have a cup to his name, no matter how close the Pens got in 2008. He's a cautionary tale, a sad footnote, a could-have-been. Claude wonders if it freaks him out, but that's just another item on the list of things they don't talk about.

Sid turns on NPR, and they listen to the host talk about whether the government is going to shutdown until Claude changes the channel. The sound only comes out of the left speaker, but Sid doesn't make any comments.

Claude takes them to the nature trail, the one that used to be a railroad line years ago. There's a newer path that runs by the park, but Claude has always like this one more—the telephone poles with their cracked insulators, the crunch of gravel beneath his feet. He's been meaning to come here for a while, and this thing with Sid has given him the excuse he needed.

The lot is tiny, only big enough for a car or two, and they're the only ones there which is good for Claude's plans.

"Come on," he says, grabbing his bag out of the backseat, and leads the way down the trail.

The trees are tipped in orange and red, and it's a beautiful day for a walk. He takes them around to the point, and the bugs aren't bad this late in the season, which is good since Claude had forgotten bug spray.

"Here," he says when they come out of the woods and walk down the sloping hill to the edge of the drop off. Claude unfurls the blanket he'd brought and hands Sid a can of warm beer.

"Nice," Sid says, and Claude rolls his eyes. For someone who was a superstar once upon a time before life got in the way, Sid's always pretty easygoing. It doesn't take a lot to impress him.

They sit in companionable silence and drink their beers, watching the ripples on the lake and listening to the frogs singing. The sunset is gorgeous, bright orange with pink clouds crawling across the sky, and Claude leans back on his elbows. Out here it's like he's removed from his problems, even though if he concentrates he can hear the highway running in the distance.

Sid points, wordlessly, and Claude follow his finger. There's a great blue heron standing at the side of the water, almost camouflaged with the grasses. As he watches, it takes a slow step forward and freezes again, waiting.

"You know," Claude says, quietly so he doesn't disturb the atmosphere. "Back when feathers were really popular in hats, an ounce of egret feathers cost more than an ounce of gold."

"How many feathers is that?" Sid asks, looking intrigued.

Claude shrugs. "Enough for lots of hats, I guess."

They stay until the light starts to fade and the heron takes off, and then Claude stretches and pulls Sid up to his feet.

"You ready for the good part?" he asks, shaking out the blanket and rolling it back up to fit in his bag. He hadn't brought anything to put their cans in, but he holds them upside down before he sticks them in the bag. Hopefully there won't be any leakage, but he can always put the blanket in the wash.

"There's more?" Sid says, and Claude grins.

"Come on."

He leads Sid into the actual woods, because even though the trail isn't used that often he's not really down with public sex. Claude remembers a clearing somewhere around here from mushroom hunting, and he finds it without much trouble. He scans for poison ivy, but the vegetation is pretty sparse.

Sid gets the idea when Claude pushes him against a tree and kisses him, openmouthed and filthy.

"I'm not sure about this," Sid says when Claude pulls away. He's looking around like someone's going to pop out from behind a tree.

"You don't have to do anything, just stand there," Claude says. He flips his baseball cap around backwards and gingerly drops to his knees.

"But what if someone comes?" Sid says, all too coherently for someone who's getting his fly unzipped. Claude snickers at his pun.

"Well, I hope someone comes, or I'm doing it wrong."

Sid looks unimpressed, at least until Claude gets a hand around him. He puts the condom on, stuffs the wrapper in the pocket of Sid's jeans, and gets down to business.

Claude's never been able to deepthroat for shit, but he gives it his best go. The weight in his mouth, the power he has even on his knees, is intoxicating. Sid's got teeth sunk into the palm of one hand, and the other is twined through Claude's hair. His scalp feels tight, and the sensation sends a thrill through him.

He pulls off for long enough to say, "It's okay to pull my hair, just don't choke me," and then goes back down. Sid must like that, because he gently tightens his grip, firm enough that Claude can't help but squirm, but not too much so that it's painful.

Sid keeps his hips still, trembling under Claude's hands, and Claude sucks him fast and messy, the obscene sounds of spit and slurping a strange counterpoint to the dwindling birdsong and the leaves crunching under Claude's knees as he shuffles closer.

Sid's thighs twitch when he gets close, and he comes with a bitten-off moan that he muffles with his hand.

"There," Claude says, dusting off his knees as he stands back up. Sid's still leaning bonelessly against the tree, and he pulls Claude closer, jerks him off there with his pants halfway down his thighs.

Claude opens his eyes when he's got his feet under him again—his left knee is aching but not too badly—to see Sid standing there holding the tied-off condom like he doesn't know what to do with it.

"Dude," he says.

"What, you want me to just litter?" Sid asks, looking affronted.

"Well, I'm not carrying it back."

Sid looks like he's going to argue the point, then he says, "Fine," and goes to stick it in his pocket.

"I was kidding," Claude laughs, grabbing the condom from him and dropping it in his bag. The blanket is definitely going to have to be washed now. "Sid, you're so easy I'm almost embarrassed for you."

Sid taps the brim of Claude's baseball cap, which he's still got on backwards. "Sure," he says. "I'm the embarrassing one."

***

Everyone gets pulled into a staff meeting at the beginning of the day at the library, where JoAnn stars telling them about the new library policy concerning bedbugs.

"Bedbugs?" hisses Delita, leaning over Claude like she thinks JoAnn is playing some elaborate joke. "How?"

"Well, it looks like some community members have an infestation, and somehow they got transferred to the library, either through the patrons themselves or their books. We'll go over the signs of bedbugs in books, and we've got exterminators coming next week. Everything's going to be fine, we just need to follow procedure."

"They don't pay us enough for this," Jody mutters, shifting on her chair like she can feel something crawling on her. Claude doesn't say it, but she's right.

"They don't like hard surfaces, so they can't travel very far," JoAnn is saying, "and we're getting rubbing alcohol to keep the counters scrubbed down. Ninety-nine percent isopropyl alcohol, not that diluted shit." She looks like a warrior standing at the front of the room, never mind her cardigan and sensible shoes. "We don't know when they first came in, but we're going to get this under control."

Claude stares at the projector as she clicks to the next slide on how to clean soft surfaces and what to do if they find any live ones, and tries to figure out how he could make rent if he just quit.

***

Claude's busy sucking a hickey on Sid's neck, low enough that it'll be covered by his shirt, when his phone starts ringing.

"Shit, sorry," he says, turning it off after glancing at the caller ID. It's the hospital again, for the twentieth time, and if they want something that badly they can leave another message.

"Important?" Sid asks, playing with the trail of hair leading down Claude's belly.

"No, just the hospital," Claude says, and Sid pulls back to look at him. "My… mother," he says, mouth twisting on the word. "She's dying, we're estranged, it's a whole story that's too long to get into right now."

Claude reaches for him but Sid resists, and Claude curses himself for breaking the mood.

"You're sure?" Sid asks, and Claude momentarily wants to throttle him for not just dropping it.

"Positive," he says, voice clipped tight, and tries to will his flagging erection back in order.

Sid still doesn't look convinced, but he nods and scoots closer, pushes Claude's shirt off the bed as he does.

"If you ever want to talk," he says, and Claude nods, like that's something he'd ever voluntarily do. He wouldn't have even checked his phone in the first place, except that the bus Cameron is supposed to ride home is one of the first ones to leave the school, and his robotics club keeps running long so he misses it sometimes.

"Yeah," Claude says, and ignores the way Sid frowns at him. He presses the tips of his fingers against the furrows in Sid's forehead. "Really, it's fine."

He pulls Sid closer, and this time he goes. Claude makes a mental note to put his phone on silent next time they're fucking, or at least see if he can get one of the boys to change his ringtones so he knows who's calling. Then Sid bites his collarbone and Claude loses the thread.

***

"You want to help Cameron with his science project?" Danny asks, dropping into the chair across from Claude.

"Are you just trying to distract me from this shit with Marlene?" Claude says, looking up from his reheated dinner.

Danny sighs. "Will it make you feel better if I say yes? Though actually, if you need distracted the washer's broken and someone needs to haul everything down to the laundromat."

"Thanks for thinking of me," Claude says around his mouthful of baked beans. He takes another look at Danny and pushes his beer over. Danny looks like he needs it more.

"How's it going with Sharron?" he asks.

"Great." Danny smiles like an idiot, and Claude hides his answering smile behind his hand. It's been a pain working around both of their schedules—Sharron working at the hospital and Danny at the Amazon distribution center—but Claude's glad he has someone. Sharron's funny, and she doesn't take any shit. They work well together.

"But yeah," Danny says when he comes back from wherever his mind had gone. "Cameron's thing shouldn't take up too much time. I would have done it myself, but I think I'm not cool enough."

"Aw, you know they still love you best," Claude says, and easily dodges Danny's half-hearted punch to his shoulder.

***

It's Claude's turn to orchestrate their activity-before-fucking on Friday and he's got a half-assed plan that involves takeout and blowjobs, but he's standing outside Sid's house and Sid's not picking up his phone.

"Come on, come on," Claude mutters, trying to keep the Kung Pao Chicken from tipping over. He rings the doorbell a couple more times. His and Danny's doorbell hasn't worked since Carson winged it with a soccer ball, so with that in mind Claude starts knocking.

He's working himself up to be pissed that Sid blew him off when the door opens. Sid's standing there with a hand shading his eyes, dressed in a pair of boxers and a t-shirt that must be older than Caelan. He looks like someone ran over him with a truck, then backed up a couple of times for good measure.

"Sorry," Sid says, wincing as he does. "I'm not feeling well. Rain check?"

After the final concussion that put Sid out of the game forever, at least if he wanted to stay alive, he'd managed to shake off most of the post-concussion symptoms, but some still remain—namely migraines and the occasional bout of dizziness.

If this were two years ago, or even last year, Claude would have left him to lick his wounds in peace, no questions asked, but here, standing on Sid's doorstep, he hesitates. He's not sure why—he should just take the food and bring it back for Danny and the boys, or maybe go hit up Wayne and see what he's doing, or even just put it in the refrigerator. Anything other than asking, "Want me to stay?" and then having to pretend like he has any idea what his vocal chords are doing.

Sid squints at him, and he really does look pathetic like this. Claude sighs and pushes his way inside, careful not to jostle Sid, and shuts the door to keep the terrible brightness out.

"Pathetic, Crosby." Claude sets the takeout down on the counter, gently, and then steers Sid back to the bedroom, his shoulders warm beneath Claude's palms. "Were you taking a nap?"

"Trying to," Sid says as he pushes open the door to his room. The blinds have been pulled and the room is dim and shadowed, but Claude is surprised to realize that he can navigate it even without sight. Somewhere in between all their hookups, the layout has become ingrained beneath his skin.

He gets Sid settled, Sid batting at him like Cameron used to when he was little and trying get out of going to bed but too cranky to use his words. Claude sets a glass of water on the nightstand before latching the door behind him.

It would be weird if he stayed, right? They aren't really dating, despite Claude playing tour guide for Sid this season, but Claude hesitates by the front door. The food is still sitting out in the kitchen and he's overcome by a sudden irrational idea that if he leaves, even locking the door behind him, someone will break in and… do _something_. Trash the house or just kick Sid when he's down.

Claude stands there in the entranceway for one long, ineffable moment, before turning around with a sense of bafflement and setting about putting the takeout in the fridge. He closes the refrigerator door softly, even though there's no way that Sid can hear that from his bedroom.

Then he goes to the living room, pulls out his phone, fails at guessing Sid's wifi password, and settles in to play the latest mind-numbingly stupid game the boys have installed on his phone.

The next thing he knows the light has changed, he's got a crick in his neck from the way his head is bent into the arm of the couch, and Sid is standing in the middle of the room.

"Jesus," Claude says, sitting up and clutching his chest. His phone slips off his lap and down to the rug with a muted thump. "You scared the crap out of me."

" _You?_ What about me?"

Claude grins at the indignity in Sid's voice. "Feeling better, I see?"

"Yeah," Sid says, rubbing a hand through the mess that's currently his hair. "I think I can safely say it's been downgraded to a headache."

He looks sleep-warm and rumpled, and Claude's gaze lingers on the threadbare shirt where his nipples are almost showing through.

Sid sighs. "I'm not up for sex right now, sorry. I know this isn't what you wanted."

Claude rolls his eyes and levers himself off the couch. "I'm not actually a dick, you know. I've got Chinese in the refrigerator, what do you say we break in your bar stools?"

"I eat there," Sid says, looking affronted.

"Whatever you say. Just know I'm only humoring you since you're an invalid and all."

"Asshole," Sid says, but he's smiling.

With no prospect of sex, hanging out with Sid should feel strange but it's not. Sitting with him at the kitchen island, ribbing each other, Sid listening with rapt attention to Claude's best library stories, it feels companionable and stable. It feels like they've been doing this for their entire lives, like they've fallen back into something that hadn't existed before that moment.

***

Sid drags him to some war reporter reading that turns out to be pretty interesting, and Claude takes him to a drive-in. They spend more time making out during the movie than actually watching it, but Claude's okay with that.

Sid picks the zoo; Claude takes the boys along with them because Danny hasn't gotten the chance to get laid in forever and Sharron has three roommates. They both get food poisoning when Sid wants to try some sketchy sushi place. Claude destroys him at pong. Sid skates circles around him at the roller rink.

It's comfortable, Claude thinks. It's fun. It's easy.

It's temporary, a tiny voice whispers, and he shouldn't keep forgetting that. It can't last—that's not how his life works. It's not how _they_ work.

***

"Why do you think he's still here?" Danny asks as he's frying something up on the stove. "Postcard season's over."

"My body and sense of humor, obviously," Claude answers. "Hey, it's my turn to make the display. You think mysteries or dystopia?"

"Mysteries. You still getting it on with our latest claim to fame? If you get married make sure you don't sign a pre-nup."

"Hardy har," Claude deadpans. "Nobody says that anymore, old man. And anyways, he's…" he trails off, but Danny keeps looking at him expectantly.

"He's—" how to describe Sid, with his biting sarcasm and stupid laugh, the way he can't let Claude win at anything, the best kind of asshole with an ass to die for "—nice, okay?" Claude finishes lamely.

"Nice," snickers Carson from the living room. Claude glares in his direction, and hears what's probably Cameron kicking him.

"No hitting," Danny admonishes over the sound of retribution before turning back to Claude. "So you like him." There's a smile flitting around the edges of his mouth, and Claude takes a too-large bite of his sandwich to avoid answering.

"It's just… different," Claude says when Danny doesn't do him the courtesy of filling the silence. "I mean, I was fine with what we were doing before, but now is good too," he finishes lamely. "It's not like it's serious or anything."

"Sure," Danny says, siting down at the table across from Claude. He unfurls the paper he'd obviously stolen from their neighbors, and Claude is just stupid enough to think that's going to be the end of it. "Just as long as you invite me to the wedding," Danny says, and starts laughing when Claude attempts to kick him and hits the table leg instead.

Over the sound of his cussing, he hears Carson call, mocking, "No hitting!"

***

By the time Claude gets to the library, he's hit up every store in the area and decided that Cameron's model of the solar system is entirely too much work. Still, he's glad he doesn't work retail, even if the library is getting more trying by the week.

They've got a new procedure for the bed bugs, which involves heating all the incoming books in a giant contraption in the basement to kill the little fuckers, and the bug sniffer dog is coming again over the weekend. A dog. That sniffs for bed bugs.

Claude doesn't know how this is his life.

"Hey," he hears. He looks up to find some guy at the counter who looks familiar, but he can't quite place him.

"Ready to check out?" Claude asks as he swipes the card on top of the stack of books. Matt McCaughey, the screen reads. Three dollars and change in fines, no holds.

"So, I haven't see you in ages," Matt says, and the timbre of his voice sparks something. Claude has a sudden memory of bruises on his hips and that same voice talking dirty to him in the back of his car and some of the best damn head he's ever gotten.

"Yeah, been pretty busy," he says, printing off the receipt. "You still at the garage?"

"Yeah," Matt says. He taps the top book on his stack, something on motorcycles. "I'm just fixing up this junker, a real beauty. Maybe I could take you for a ride sometime?" The way he says it is incredibly suggestive, and Claude feels a warm shiver run up his spine.

"Maybe," he says with a smile. "Here, I'll give you my number." He fumbles for a pen before finding one under the counter and scrawls his number on the receipt.

"Claude," he hears and turns to see Sid glaring at him. He raises his eyebrows and passes Matt the paper.

"Cool," Matt says, scooting his books off the counter. "I'll call you." He winks, then walks out the front doors, his long stride eating up the space.

Claude watches him go, then turns to Sid in exasperation. Sid's got a look on his face like he just stubbed his toe, all pissy with his lips pressed together.

"What is your problem?" Claude asks.

Sid huffs. "My problem is that you apparently think it's acceptable to pick up while you're at work." His voice is low, but Claude feels his words hit like a slap.

"It's not like I'm feeling him up in the bathroom," he says, stung. "And we're not exclusive, in case you forgot. You've never had a problem with that before." Claude has had enough of possessive assholes to last him a lifetime—he just hadn't thought Sid was one of them.

"You are so…" Sid clenches his hands like he wants them wrapped around Claude's throat. "What do you think we're doing? I thought things were different now."

"We're not together," Claude hisses, and this isn't the place to be having this fight, especially with a patron lingering near the display obviously trying to eavesdrop. "I think I would have realized if we were dating."

Sid gives him a look that makes Claude's blood boil, like _Claude's_ the one who's acting unreasonable here. "I said I wanted to do things other than fuck, and that's what you got out of it?"

Claude gapes at him. "You never said date. You can't—You can't _trick_ someone into being in a relationship."

Sid throws up his hands, then looks around like he's worried someone might have seen him. The woman by the display looks like she doesn't know whether to stay or leave. "I didn't think I was," he hisses when his full attention is back on Claude.

Sid is all self-righteous indignation, stupid fish lips pressed into a line. He sets a bag from the bakery Claude had been talking about down on the counter with a sharp motion, like he can't bear to touch it. Like any of this could rub off on him.

"Here, you can share them with whoever else you're sleeping with," Sid says, and Claude feels his hands clench involuntarily.

"If you're going to call me a slut, watch who else you're painting with that brush," Claude snarls back, flipping open the receipt printer just to have something to do. His comeback doesn't make sense, but he's too mad to care. "And where do you get off? We never had that conversation, you don't get a say, and, oh, we're _not dating_."

Sid shakes his head and starts walking away.

"Hey," Claude calls after him. "Hey!"

Sid doesn't stop.

Claude swears, too loud if the look JoAnn gives him from her office is any indication, and watches as Sid walks out the front doors. That fucker, like they're married or something. Like Sid didn't say when they'd started this that he just wanted someone to hang out with or whatever, and now suddenly Claude's the bad guy here?

He glares into the space where Sid had been until someone comes up to the counter. Even then, he desensitizes the books with prejudice and stews on the entire encounter until his shift is over.

***

"Sid, you asshole," Claude shouts as he pounds on the door. "You can't just leave in the middle of a fight. I was at work!"

Sid yanks open the door so fast Claude stumbles.

"I thought this was something it obviously wasn't," he says before Claude can get another word out. "So for that I'm sorry."

"I don't understand," Claude says. His anger is draining, confronted by Sid's slumped shoulders.

"I know you don't understand," Sid snaps, turning so fast that Claude backs up a step. It's not that he thinks Sid is going to hit him, but seeing him angry is like seeing another person behind his eyes.

"I have to go," Sid says, and he does have a suitcase sitting in the entranceway. Claude wonders if he even would have caught him had traffic been worse, or if he would have been left knocking on the door to an empty house.

"What?" Claude says. He shouldn't be blindsided by this, by Sid leaving like he was always going to, but somehow he is.

"This was a mistake."

That hurts, an unexpected sting, and Claude's temper comes back full force. "Then why did you do it?"

"I guess I thought you were someone else," Sid says, voice tight. He's looking at Claude like he doesn't recognize him, like he didn't know going into this that Claude was a mess, unfit for anything except a quickie.

Claude's back is up now, looking for a way to turn this around on Sid. The words come tumbling out of his mouth, everything he can use to hurt. "I guess so. You want the truth? You were just a pretty distraction, a washed-up has-been," Claude spits. "You're a good fuck and not much else. I kept waiting for you to leave. Just didn't want to burn that bridge for next year."

Sid steps closer, his eyes bright, and Claude's entire body is humming. "At least I did something with my life. At least I'm not going to die here, surrounded by my own mediocrity, eh?" He bites off the last syllable, sharp.

That hits, and it hits hard. From the gleam of satisfaction in Sid's eye, it looks like he knows it.

"Fuck you," Claude says, as calmly as he can, and slams the door behind him.

He's so mad he's shaking with it by the time he gets home, but drives carefully—doesn't run any yellow lights, doesn't drive over the speed limit. He figures that has to count for something.

"I'm going out," he tells Danny, dumping the bags from the store on the counter. "Tell Cameron I'll help with his solar system later."

"It's a semester project," Danny says. He's working weird hours again and just about to head out the door. "I'm sure it'll keep."

Claude nods and gets out of there. He drives with no real destination in mind until his phone buzzes. It's a text from Luke, wanting to know if he's still coming to the bar. It's a bad idea and Claude knows it, but he texts back _duh_ with one hand at a stop sign. He feels like making bad decisions today.

***

"Come on, man," Wayne sighs beside him. "Forget him. He's not worth it."

They're at the bar they usually go to, Luke at the counter getting another pitcher for the table. Claude shrugs and takes another swig of lukewarm beer. He's been nursing the same damn one for what feels like forever. He'd get plastered, but he just… isn't feeling it. He thought he would, but for some reason everything is grating on his nerves, too complicated and too much.

He feels his phone vibrate and digs it out to find _hey its matt ;)_ , and suddenly everything seems simple.

 _can I come over_ , he types, and it isn't long before Matt sends him an address on the other side of town.

"I'm going to take off," he tells Wayne, and waves off his protests. "Promised I'd help Cameron with his science project." It's not a lie, but it's not quite the truth, either—he doesn't have to help him tonight. He doesn't know why he isn't telling Wayne where he's going, but he doesn't want to have a conversation about this. He just wants something to take him out of his head.

"Just, drive safe," Wayne says. He looks like he's not convinced that Claude is as okay as he's pretending to be, but Brayden doesn't have the same qualms.

"Can I have the rest of this," he asks, already taking a swig out of Claude's discarded glass.

"Knock yourself out," Claude tells him, and then he's gone.

The drive doesn't take long at all and there's not a lot of traffic this early in the night, mostly people going to parties or maybe the movies, Claude doesn't know. He thinks about how he and Sid were supposed to go see the showing of the latest action film at the Megaplex the town over, then tries not to think about Sid anymore and how he thinks Claude is a stupid slut.

"Hey," Matt says, answering the door with a beer in his hand. "That was fast. You want a drink?"

He doesn't look anything like Sid—blond hair, taller, thicker cock from what Claude remembers. As soon as he realizes what he's thinking, he wants to scrub the thought from his head.

"No," he says. "I want to fuck. If you don't, I'll find someone who does," and that's all it takes. They fumble into the bedroom, and Claude doesn't have a chance to get more than an impression of wood paneling from the 70's and checkered carpet, a wilting potted plant in the corner, before they hit the bed.

Matt pulls Claude's hair, hard, and tries to use too much lube, and Claude snarls at him until he gets pushed face down. Matt rides him into the mattress while Claude tries to breath around the pillow his face is smashed into. It's hard and selfish, their bodies colliding in a way that make it clear that they're both after whatever they can get, without much regard for the other. It's everything Claude wanted, and it's still not enough.

When Claude comes, it feels like it's been punched out of him, and Matt doesn't stop. Claude slumps forward and lets Matt pound into him, and tells himself that there's not a hint of repentance in the way he listens to him grunting.

In the aftermath, with the sheets trailing on the floor and Claude trying not to show how much being on all fours had fucked up his bad knee, it's too quiet.

The aching hole where all of Claude's anger had been has simmered down, leaving numbness instead. He lies there on Matt's queen-sized bed for one long moment, just a moment, before he levers himself back up. Matt is tying off the condom, and Claude remembers that this is the part where clothes have to be found and put on and re-zipped, that there isn't any reason to stay.

"That everything you wanted?" Matt asks from his sprawl on the bed, carefully out of the wet spot and the spilled lube, looking like he'd just done Claude a favor. There should be an afterglow or something, but if there is Claude can't find it. He's cold and the walls feel like they're pressing in, and all of the fight has gone out of him.

Claude shrugs as he drags his pants out from under the bed and re-buttons his flannel with hands that don't shake, not even a little.

"I'll let myself out," he says. He can only find one sock, but he decides to take the loss and shoves it in his pocket, pulls his shoes on.

"Hey, anytime," Matt says. "You've got my number."

"Yeah, sure," Claude says, and he's never meant anything less.

He doesn't think as he starts the car and pulls out of Matt's drive, and he especially doesn't think about how Matt's not standing by the front door watching him pull away. There's no reason he should be.

"You're back late," Danny says quietly when Claude gets home.

Claude shrugs and tosses his jacked over the back of his chair. "I can pick Caelan up from rehearsal on Thursday," he tells Danny instead of telling him about Matt.

"I thought you were going bird watching or something?" Danny says. It would be a perfect time to tell him about his fight with Sid, but for some reason the words won't come. It's like if he says them out loud then it really is over, and all Claude will be left with is his job at the library and the endless trawling decades in this town.

"Nah," Claude says instead, and snags a banana that's on the brown side of ripe. He starts peeling it, the flesh pressing down under his fingers as he does.

"Great," Danny says. "I was going to ask Nancy from next-door, but you know what she's like."

Danny looks tired, like he hasn't been getting enough sleep, and guilt sits heavy and cloying on Claude's skin. With everything that's been happening with Marlene, Sid was a way to get out of his head and his life, even if just for a little while. Danny doesn't have the same luxuries, and Claude's not the one taking care of three kids.

"I'm going to be around more, promise," he says, and Danny shrugs.

"It's not a big deal."

Claude stares at the table for a while before looking back up. "I thought you were at work?"

"Nah," Danny says. "I was filling in for the end of Clarissa's shift. She had to take off early because her kid's sick." They sit in companionable silence until Danny finally calls it a night and goes to bed, dumping his mug in the sink as he goes.

Claude sits under the light—too dim since they'd blown the bulb and only had sixty watts to replace it with—and thinks about going to bed as well. He can feel the tackiness of lube on his thighs and he wants a shower, but actually taking one seems like too much effort. It feels like the day has been stretched out so thin he's translucent.

Claude gives himself until he finishes the last of the banana, one careful bite at a time, and then throws the peel away and goes to get ready for bed.

He can't turn his mind off as he's trying to sleep. Maybe he shouldn't have fucked Matt, but if they were dating there would have been a conversation, something. Sid's the one who's got his panties in a bunch, not Claude. The last thing he needs is some jealous asshole in his life.

But on the other hand, maybe they were. Dating. He tries to think about it, but it slides off the surface of his mind, doesn't sit quite right. It's not something that he _does_ , but in hindsight he can see where Sid got the wrong idea.

Claude doesn't know why either of them freaked out so badly, especially himself. It's not like Sid proposed or something, but the feeling of being blindsided sticks with him as headlights slide across the wall, the light striped from coming in through the miniblinds. He doesn't know what he's doing, which isn't new but feels especially shitty right now.

Stupid, he thinks to himself. Why is he always so fucking stupid.

It's a long time before he manages to get to sleep.

***

Sid doesn't call and Claude doesn't either. It's not like they ever did before, or that Sid would start now after how they'd left things, but Claude can't help the traitorous lurch of his heart every time the phone rings. He's still angry, but it's hardening into something else, something a lot like hurt. He could call himself, or text, but that feels like giving up ground. Whatever else Claude is, he's got enough shit in his life that he's not going to turn himself into a doormat. The thought of Sid ignoring his calls is too much.

Claude picks up when the hospital calls and when Cameron needs a ride, but other than that he just lets it ring.

***

Wayne thinks Claude's going to regret it—not going to see Marlene one last time. Wayne doesn't know the full story, but his grandmother had died suddenly last year and Claude knows he's still got regrets about the entire affair. It's different, though. Nothing Claude does is going to change the past.

It's been years since Marlene left him in a car for half the day while she was drinking herself into a stupor at the bar, but Claude still remembers it. This was before the drugs and the lying and everything else, back when Claude could still look at the woman and see his mother.

But she still _was_ his mother once. Even with the estrangement and everything that came before it, there's this little niggling part of Claude that says he should go, that this time she's really sorry. Claude knows it's probably all a fantasy, but even if she's the same old Marlene, he can have some closure at least.

Danny has to go to the hospital to argue about the incorrect statements they keep getting from when Caelan had fractured his arm over the summer, and he'd dropped Claude off at work because Claude's car wouldn't start, so it just makes sense to go with him. That's what Claude tells himself, anyways. He tries not to think about it.

He doesn't think about Marlene when he does shelf reading or when he fills up the cooker with books or when he clocks out.

He's still not thinking about her when Danny pulls into the parking lot.

"I'm sorry," Danny tells him as he reaches over to unlatch the passenger's side door. "He got in a fight and they needed me to pick him up."

Claude glances in the back, and sure enough there's Carson sulking against the window, holding a bag of frozen peas against his face.

"It's fine," Claude says as he buckles in. "What were you fighting for, bud?" he asks, twisting around.

Carson ignores him.

Claude looks at Danny, but Danny just purses his lips and shakes his head without ever taking his eyes off the road as he pulls back into traffic. "Don't bother," he says, and Claude flips the radio on to try and defuse the tension.

The drive to the hospital can only be defined as awkward. It doesn't do anything to help the way Claude's palms start sweating halfway there. His thoughts tangle and fall over themselves, and the bland gray of the buildings and the sky does nothing to alleviate his anxiety. Danny thinks he's making a mistake, but Claude doesn't know anymore. He doesn't know anything.

It's almost a relief when Danny pulls into the hospital lot and finds a spot in the back. Almost.

Carson says he's going to wait in the car, even though there's nothing for him to do because Danny's already taken his phone away. They shouldn't be too long, not for this, Claude thinks.

"He's got a dentist appointment in an hour and a half," Danny tells him as they're walking across the parking lot. "If it takes forever in billing, can you run him over there? It's the place all the way over on Spruce by the elementary school."

Claude nods, jerky, and the world moves in jumps around him until they're walking through the double set of automatic doors.

He buys a bunch of flowers in the guest shop, yellow ones that are wilting at the edges. He pays too much for them, but there's a haze of panic sparking off his skin. He just has to get through this and then he can talk with the doctor, or maybe just make a break for it, and it'll be over. Whatever the outcome is, whether he's making the biggest mistake of his life or not, it'll be over.

Danny runs into Sharron, and she takes them back after pressing a quick kiss to Danny's mouth. Claude's shoes squeak on the linoleum, and all too soon they're in front of her room. Everything telescopes for a brief moment before Claude pushes the door open, holding on too tightly to the flowers.

Marlene is lying in bed, older than Claude remembers, though that makes sense, and for one long minute he doesn't feel anything. She's covered in wires and machines, and there a faint whooshing filling the room, or maybe Claude's head, and he thinks a hospital is probably a good place to passes out in, except for the fact that he really doesn't want to cause a scene.

"I can't do this," Claude says, and walks right back out. "Danny, I can't—" he shoves the flowers at him. This was a terrible idea. A really, truly, absolutely spit-in-your-face _awful_ —

"Okay," Danny says, calm. "Okay. I'll take care of it."

Claude walks down the hall, but everything is too sterile, too white, and everyone seems like they know where they're going, what they're doing. He's just going to get in someone's way, he thinks, and gets lost trying to figure out which door he'd come in.

He just… he hadn't expected how seeing her again would make him feel, like there's a noose winding around his throat. Like he's drowning on dry land.

That's his answer, he guesses. Fucking closure, like that ever happens.

"Claude?" he hears someone call. He turns around and Sharron is standing there looking slightly confused, probably at the way he'd been wandering around hyperventilating a little. "Are you all right?" she asks.

"Sharron," he says, avoiding her question. "Danny told me you're off soon, right?"

She nods, and finally, finally something like a miracle.

"Can you give him a ride when he's done?" he continues. It's the coward's way out to run away, but when she says yes, all Claude can feel is relief.

"Thank you," he says. "Thank you."

She's still looking at him like she's worried he's going to do something, or maybe have a breakdown in the middle of the hall, but Claude doesn't judge her for it. He'd probably do the same thing.

Over her shoulder he notices a sign with an arrow directing him to the parking lot. Claude feels stupid about missing it, and about never having been here enough to know his way around, and about freaking out. However, feeling stupid isn't enough to stop him from power walking out of there and leaving the heavy lifting to Danny.

Even once he's outside of the walls pressing down on him, Claude still can't pull in a full breath. He bends over and plants his hands on his knees for a minute, just focusing on the asphalt and the specks of mica mixed in until he feels almost normal. Then he straightens up and keeps walking.

"Carson," Claude says when he gets in the driver's seat and pulls out his own set of keys. "Dentist's office then home, okay?"

Carson clambers over the console to get into the passenger's seat, kicking the bag of peas onto the floor as he does. He doesn't say anything about how early they're going to be, and he doesn't ask why Danny isn't with them. Claude wonders if that's a tribute of how bad he looks, or if Carson just doesn't want to ask.

Claude can't help but see the hospital bed as he drives. He tries to think of something else, but it just keeps playing over and over in his mind. He'd walking into her room and left—just _left_. Couldn't even keep it together for five fucking minutes.

Carson scuffs his feet against the floor mat. "Light's green."

Claude takes a deep breath, focuses on what's happening right now, and drives.

The waiting room at the dentist's office is half-full and smells faintly of vomit, but they've got a water cooler in the corner. Claude takes one of the tiny cone-shaped cups and watches the water splatter against the sides as it fills.

He should have stayed. He should have at least put the flowers on the table or something. He should have said hi even though she doesn't care, even though he hasn't talked to her in years, even though he still doesn't really want to now.

Claude looks around for something to distract him from the spiral his thoughts, but everything in the room is blandly inoffensive. The paintings are watercolor landscapes that could be found in any hotel room, and the magazines are all well-thumbed and on gardening and economics.

The receptionist behind her panel of Plexiglas shuffles some paperwork around, answers a call, checks in a mother with a young daughter who begins running around the waiting room with too much energy, knocking over the meager assortment of toys at the tiny table in the children's section.

"Briere," the dental hygienist calls after an eternity, and Cameron goes. Claude picks up a magazine and starts flipping through it, but when he reaches the last page he still doesn't have any idea what it was about.

***

Claude hears the front door open, but he stays on the couch. "I'm a terrible person," he says without looking away from the celebrity game show on the screen. It'd been what was playing when he turned the TV on, and he hadn't felt like changing the channel.

"No," Danny says, "you're not."

"I couldn't even be in the same _room_ as her. I don't…" Claude looks up at Danny helplessly.

"You're a wonderful person," Danny tells him, sitting down beside him. "And you don't owe her anything."

Claude shakes his head, like he can stop the words before they hit him. He feels like all his emotions have been put into one of those bottles that make miniature cyclones if you shake them right, and also kind of like he's going to throw up.

"I'm sorry for ditching you at the hospital, I just—" The words come out too quickly, rushing into each other like Claude can't even control his own tongue.

"Claude," Danny says, and puts his hand on the back of Claude's neck. "You're fine. Just breathe for me. It's okay, I understood."

Claude takes a deep breath and puts head into his hands. "Okay," he says, then repeats that a couple of times like that'll make it so. Okay, okay, okay.

He has a sudden memory of Carson leaving the bag of peas in the back of the car. He should probably go get them, but the thought seems far away and unimportant. It's already done. There's nothing else he can do.

He doesn't know how long they sit like that, Danny grounding him, the studio audience applauding, but when he finally straightens up his neck feels stiff. Maybe it's from the way his face had pressed into the mattress at Matt's house half a lifetime ago, but he doesn't want to think about that right now.

The living room looks the same as it always does—detritus from their lives left on the coffee table, the rug folded over at one end just waiting to trip someone, the light flickering slightly.

He doesn't want to think about the hospital anymore, think about what this means for him or the woman who's mother to him in name only.

"Sid's gone," he says quietly. "I don't know if he's coming back."

Danny's silent for a long minute. He doesn't say anything about how many times Claude had said they weren't anything, or that it's going to be okay, or how Sid was always going to leave. Claude is unspeakably grateful for it.

Danny tightens his grip on the back of Claude's neck before releasing him. "I thought you were going to go with him, when he left," he says, and Claude turns to look at him. Danny's staring out the window, but there's nothing out there but the gray sky and melting snow.

"Go with him?" he parrots. "We weren't like that."

"You were always hanging out, he made you happy, he—" Danny shrugs. "It was just a thought."

"Yeah," Claude says, because he doesn't know what else to say to that. He can almost imagine it, but he can almost imagine a lot of things.

***

A week passes.

Claude yells at Caelan for leaving his stuff on the kitchen table and feels terrible about it afterwards, and the hospital calls about organ donation for Marlene, and by the time Claude gets to work he's not sure how his day could get any worse. Maybe if the house burned down while he was away.

He's helping pin up the last of the streamers for the winter festival when JoAnn calls him into her office. He'd drawn the short straw so he gets to wear the customary Cat in the Hat costume, but her tone isn't a good sign.

"Look," she tells him once the door is shut. "You're a good worker, a good guy, but if you miss any more time I can't do anything. You've already used up all of your personal days, and my boss has been looking for any excuse to save some money."

Claude stands there and lets her voice wash over him, all the excuses falling out of his mind. He can't believe that even removed, even half-dead, his mother is still fucking things up for him.

The candy bowl on JoAnn's desk is half-full of Werther's and what he's sure are those shitty cinnamon drops. He wonders how long they've been there since it looks like one has oozed out of its wrapper at the bottom of the container, but maybe that's just the way the pattern of the glass distorts the light.

"Okay," she wraps up with a sigh. "You know what to do. I'm really sorry, Claude. Please, just," she shrugs, like there's anything he can do. "Just don't give her a reason."

Claude nods, because there's not much else that he can do. He reaches out his hand for the costume, and JoAnn hands it over.

"I just had it cleaned," she says, "so if you feel something running around in there just assume it's not a bedbug." Claude smiles with what feels like the last of his energy and goes to change.

The festival is for all ages—there's hot cider and cookies, people can sign up for library cards or the programs they offer, and there's a raffle for free books. Claude usually winds up working the activities for younger children because he knows how to tie balloon animals, but he likes it. The atmosphere is lively and he gets to hang out with the librarians in the children's department who he doesn't see often.

He's just making a balloon bunny for Bobbi when he hears, "Claude?"

He turns, and there's Sid, hands jammed into his pockets, a tentative smile on his face. Claude can't quite meet his eyes. "Sid," he says, and goes back to tying the ears on the bunny.

Bobbi's watching Sid with an expression that can only be called rapturous, and Claude prays—not that he prays, mind you, but surely someone out there owes him a favor, surely—that by the time he turns back Sid will be gone.

He's not.

Sid's standing there in an outfit that makes him look like a nerd, yet somehow highlights the expanse of his biceps. His hair has too much gel in it, but Claude's wearing a giant cat suit. He thinks he's had nightmares like this.

"Sidney Crosby?" Bobbi asks, like all of her dreams are coming true. "I knew you'd come! Claude said you'd be busy, but I knew!"

She looks like she's about to hyperventilate, wonder and fear and excitement packed in a frame too small to contain them, and Sid gets right down on her level, his smile turning real like someone flipped a switch.

Claude turns away from him and hands out a couple more balloons animals. He makes an attempt at a dog, but his awareness of Sid behind him keeps distracting him and it doesn't really turn out. The boy looks like he doesn't care, but Claude gets a slightly judgmental look from his mother.

He's not going to talk to Sid, is the thing. He's probably not even here for Claude, and Claude doesn't know what to say, doesn't know how to put anything in words. He'll keep his mouth shut and they can just… be over.

He turns around and Sid's standing in front of him, hands still stuffed in his pockets. "It took me a while to get my head out of my… rear," he says, looking around at the children, and it's like all of Claude's resolutions shatter.

"I thought you'd said your piece," he says, guarded. "Didn't think you'd be back." He doesn't know what his face is doing, but it feels like he's revealing something he shouldn't be, like Sid can see straight through him. His emotions are a tangled cluster sitting heavy in his sternum.

"I live here part of the year. Of course I was coming back." Sid stalls out there for a minute before saying in a rush, "Look, just. Can we talk? Later. I didn't mean to ambush you, I just want to talk."

"Yeah," Claude says, but he can't even tell if he means it. "Look, I've got to get back to this, so—"

"Sure," Sid says, stepping back as Claude makes his way toward the make-your-own-story station, pretending that he's got business there. Claude imagines he can feel Sid watching him as he goes, but when he turns around he sees him talking to Bobbi's father by the nonfiction books.

"He wants to talk," he mutters to himself, and then a little girl tugs on his pant leg and asks if he can make her a giraffe.

By the time Claude gets home, he's realized that the prevailing emotion he's feeling is anger. Luke would say something about repression, about how trying to keep himself from getting hurt is impeding his other relationships, but Luke's full of shit.

Danny's pissed about Claude yelling at Caelan, which is justified, but Claude picks a fight about it anyway. He knows it's a shitty thing to do, but he can't seem to stop himself. It's like he's driving towards a cliff and has got his foot down on the accelerator instead of pumping the breaks. He feels out of control.

"Will you just stop," Danny finally yells, slamming one of the cabinet doors hard enough that Claude can hear the dishes inside rattle, and Claude considers letting it all burn for one fleeting instant—his friendship with Danny, the boys, whatever he's built for himself in this town. He knows Danny's weak spots as well as Danny knows his own, and it would be so easy. But even as angry as he is right now, he doesn't want that.

"I'm going out," Claude says, and doesn't wait for Danny's response.

It's freezing outside, the wind whipping though all of his layers to get at his skin, and Claude hadn't even grabbed his coat in his hurry to get out before he put his fist through the wall, brought up Sylvie, called out Danny's parenting.

Claude's so angry that he's shaking with it. He stops at the edge of the sidewalk before he gets run over by a car and flips it off just because he can, rage spinning out of him undirected.

He walks around the block once, but it doesn't help. He's shivering so hard his teeth are chattering, and he bites down on his tongue, sticks it between his teeth so he'll stop. He doesn't want to give anything here, not even a reminder that he's human.

Claude stands there for a long minute, staring at the passing cars, rain weighing down his hair, before going back inside to get his keys.

He doesn't slam the door going out this time, but it's a near thing.

Claude drives to Sid's because he doesn't know where else to go, and he's still spoiling for a fight. Wayne's out of town and the Schenns are working night construction, and if Sid wants to talk, fine. They'll talk.

He doesn't realize how late it is until Sid opens the door in his pajamas, looking frazzled, but even that's not enough to slow Claude down.

"Why are you back," he barks, and Sid stares for a minute before moving aside to let him in.

"I wanted to talk," he says, shutting the door behind him. "I wanted to see if we could work things out and get on the same page."

"Why me? God knows you could probably find someone from your glory days who'd love to hang all over you."

Claude can see a muscle in Sid's jaw twitch, but he keeps his temper. Somehow that makes him even madder, that Claude's lost all of his control somewhere between Danny's house and here, and Sid's refusing to come down to his level.

"I like you, god knows why," Sid says, chin sticking out mulishly. "And I thought you might need another friend. It's not like you're doing a great job keeping it together on your own."

"I don't need you to mother me," Claude snarls, and Sid dishes it right back at him.

"Well, you want anonymous fucking, you can get that anywhere. So why are _you_ here?"

Claude glares at him in silence, and Sid glares right back. Claude doesn't have an answer to his question, not really. Not one that he wants to get into. His life's a mess, and he's not much better.

"I don't know," Claude says, and Sid looks like he doesn't believe him. "Whatever. This was a mistake."

He turns towards the door but Sid grabs his shoulder. He's not holding tight, but it's enough to make Claude stop.

"Alright," Sid says, exasperated. "Just, wait here."

He walks towards the closet, and Claude stands there for a minute before deciding that whatever Sid's doing can wait. He's got the front door open when Sid catches up to him.

"Here," Sid says, an umbrella in his hand. "You can give it back later."

"I'm already wet, it's not like it'll help much."

Sid keeps holding it out, and Claude glares at him.

"Take it," Sid says impatiently. "Stop being an idiot and take the fucking umbrella, Giroux."

"Fine," he says, grabbing it with bad grace. He feels Sid's eyes on him as he leaves, but Sid doesn't say anything else.

The rain had turned to a downpour while he'd been inside, and Claude doesn't think anything charitable about Sid but he's glad for the cover. He dashes to his car, fumbles to get the umbrella closed, and slams the door. His keys are slippery in his grip, but he manages to get them in the ignition on the first try.

His car won't start.

Claude punches the steering wheel a couple of times, but all that accomplishes is his hand hurting. He should have taken the fucking car to the shop when it wouldn't start for work that one time, but he knew they'd find all sorts of things wrong with it that he'd have to pay for. He wonders if this is karma for something, something huge.

He could go back inside and ask Sid for a ride, or call Danny, but he just… can't. He _can't_. Maybe this is the part of him that Marlene was always talking about: stubborn, prickly, intractable. Difficult.

Claude takes a deep breath, lets it out. Does it again.

He's too far away to walk home, but he knows where Wayne keeps his spare key. He should be able to make it there on foot. He takes the keys out of the ignition, grabs the umbrella, and steps out of the car.

Sid's house is pretty secluded, and he's got mature trees lining the drive. Claude can't get the umbrella back open for a minute, so he stands under one, drops from the leaves splattering down on him. It's not much for shelter, but it's better than nothing. His hair drips, and Claude runs a hand through it, resisting the urge to start pulling.

The umbrella finally deploys, and he starts walking, shoes squelching as he goes. He wants to stop feeling like this. Unhinged. He wants out. But it's not like out is something that he can get to one day, because he's never going to _get_ out. Claude can see the path of his life, the endless arc of his future, and it looks nothing like freedom.

God, he was so fucking _stupid_ as a kid. Like everything could fit together like he wanted it to. Like his dreams were things that could be achieved if he just _worked_ hard enough. Like he's ever been enough to make it.

Now that the adrenaline rush is fading, the ache in his knee is sharpening from the cold. Claude feels oddly hollowed out. Danny, for all of his problems, well. He's got it figured out, doesn't he? Got a plan and a list of items to cross off, college savings accounts, though they're mostly empty.

Danny is planning for the future. Claude is standing in the cold in clothes that have gone dark with rainwater, shivering, in pain, and too stubborn to go back and ask for help. If he even _can_ walk back to Sid's house, the traitorous part of his brain inputs. His knee is killing him. Even if he could find someplace dry to sit down for a minute, it would just seize in the cold.

The wind is blowing sharply, cutting the rain under the umbrella, and he's getting soaked. He's trying to decide what to do a familiar gray SUV pulls up beside him. Somehow, Claude's not even surprised.

The window rolls down and Sid calls, "Get in."

Claude just stands there. He's being stupid and he knows it, but getting in feels like giving something up, something vital.

"Get in the car," Sid says. He's got his head hanging out the window, rain starting to plaster down his hair.

For one terrible moment Claude thinks he might start crying. His fingers feel frozen and cramped on the umbrella handle, and he's just so done with this entire day.

"For fuck's sake, Claude. It's freezing, get in."

Claude does as he's told.

"You drive me insane," Sid says when he's sitting in the passenger's seat. He's staring out the windshield, but it's raining too hard for him to really be looking at anything. Claude feels small, somehow, and very stupid. He sits on Sid's seats and drips.

"You ran," Claude says. His voice comes out quieter than he wants it to, but maybe that's from the rain pounding on the roof of the car. Maybe it doesn't have anything to do with him.

"We had a fight, that doesn't mean you're dead to me or whatever," and Claude flinches. It's not meant as a jab at him and Marlene, he knows that. Sid doesn't even have the full story, but it hurts and makes him vicious again.

"Yeah? Was that something I was supposed to pick up along with the fact that we'd apparently been dating the whole time?"

"Not the whole time, just lately I thought," Sid says, jaw working.

"How was I supposed to know?" Claude says, throwing up his hands. He tosses the umbrella in the backseat, where it thumps to the floor. "You _said_ it was just fucking, and even without that, we never went to my place. You didn't want to meet my friends, you met the boys like once, and…"

"And what?" Sid asks.

"And I don't know! You just didn't seem interested."

"We went out all the time," Sid says, hands tightening on the steering wheel. He's going slow to account for the rain, but Claude suddenly wants nothing more than to be driving fast, so fast the adrenaline burns. "How was that not me being interested?"

"Because that's what you wanted. I never said I did," Claude says, and that seems to take all the air out of Sid.

The rain keeps coming down, and for a long minute that's all there is, just the headlights of the passing cars creeping by, wipers going frantically. Claude doesn't know what there's left to say, really.

Sid's the one who breaks the quiet. "I should have done it differently," he says, subdued, "but I thought you knew. I though you just didn't want to say it. And I'm sorry that I made you feel like that. I don't have a lot of experience with this," he says with a dry laugh.

Claude points wordlessly when they get to the intersection, and Sid turns without further prompting. They drive in silence until they hit Claude's house. The lights are still on in the living room, and Claude doesn't know if that's because Danny's waiting up for him or because it's not late enough for bed. Sid puts the car in park in the driveway and they sit there for a minute. Claude doesn't make an attempt to get out, and Sid doesn't push it.

"Look," he says finally, turning to Claude. "I know we've been pretty shit at this so far, what with the miscommunication and everything, but I never meant to hurt you. I'm sorry. And you're not mediocre."

Claude stops staring at the light and gives Sid his full attention. "Don't," he says, and sighs. His anger has melted away as quickly as it came, just leaving this pool of numbness behind. "I'm sorry too," he says. "It wasn't true, what I said at your house before you left. I didn't mean it."

He needs to say more, but he thinks he's got just enough energy to propel him up the steps to the front door and no further. Sid nods, like that's a good enough apology, and Claude despairs. Sid deserves someone who's going to treat him right, not Claude. Someone who can find a proper apology and has less baggage. But apparently Sid missed that memo.

"Do you think we could try again?" Sid asks, and in the darkness his face is mostly shadow, but Claude can still find the familiar planes. They've known each other for years. It's easy to forget that, sometimes.

"I'll think about it," Claude says, and that seems to be enough for Sid. He nods, and Claude hesitates before he undoes his seatbelt and gets out of the car, but he can't think of anything they have left to say.

He darts through the rain, grateful for the overhang above the door, and knocks. He could use his key, but he's not sure if Danny wants to see him right now. Claude lives there too, but it still feels like Danny's house even after all these years.

It takes a minute, shorter than Claude had been expecting, and then he hears the lock turning and Danny appears.

"I'm sorry I was a dick," Claude says, his voice low and hoarse. "Look, can we do this inside?"

"Fine," Danny says, but he doesn't sound fine. He backs out of the way and Claude waves at Sid, still sitting in his car outside their house, before closing the door behind him.

He's dripping on the linoleum, scrubbing an old dishtowel through his hair when Danny comes back with a pair of sweats.

"Look," Danny says stiffly. "You can't yell at the boys like that. You want to take something out, fine, but don't take it out on them. They don't deserve it."

"I know," Claude says, nodding. "I'm going to apologize to Caelan."

"You've been acting… really erratic, and I know you've got stuff to deal with, Marlene and all, but it worries me. I wish you would let someone help."

"I'm working on it," Claude says quietly.

"I just—" Danny sighs. "You remember when you first moved in? And you said it was only temporary?"

Even feeling waterlogged and half-drowned, that makes his heart rate quicken. Danny gives him a knowing look, half fond, half exasperated.

"I'm not kicking you out, don't start freaking out about it. I'm just saying, you were never supposed to end up here. The library was just temporary. And I know plans change and everything, but I don't think living like this is making you happy. And I want you to be happy."

Danny's looking at him, and Claude doesn't deserve this kindness after everything he's put Danny's family through these last few months. He puts his towel on the table before he sits down, just to have a moment to try and compose himself.

"I know," he says. It would be so much easier to have this conversation without looking at him, but he holds eye contact. This is important. "I'm working on it," he says again, and he means it.

"Just," Danny sighs. "Think about what you want. I don't want you thinking you don't have options, because you do."

He ruffles Claude's wet hair and Claude swats at him, and it feels a little forced but they're getting back on track. It's too late to go apologize to Caelan for blowing up earlier, but he'll do it tomorrow, figure out the right words, wake up and bake the boys a big breakfast.

He catches Danny's arm when he goes to walk away and just holds him there for a minute, unsure how to say everything he's feeling. His gratitude is something indescribable, so large it feels hard to breathe sometimes. Every time he thinks about how his life would have turned out if he'd never met Danny, he can't even imagine it.

Danny seems to get it, though, because he stands there while Claude clings to him like an idiot. When he finally lets him go Danny doesn't mock him, just pats him on the shoulder and leaves the room.

***

Claude gets his stupid fucking piece of junk car towed, then fixed, and thinks. He has his answer two days later.

"Okay," he says when Sid picks up.

"Okay?" Sid asks.

"Yeah, we can give this a try for real. But," Claude says, and maybe they should be doing this face-to-face, but his schedule is jammed full and he's going to take the coward's way out this time. "I want to do it properly, if we're dating."

"Yeah, that's, yeah," Sid says.

"I'm not saying I want to meet your parents and get monogramed towels," Claude tells him. "But if you want, I'm meeting some of my friends at a bar later tonight. If you're free we could go together and you could meet them?"

"It's a date," Sid says, and Claude can hear the smile in his voice.

Wayne and the Schenns introduce themselves at the bar, and then they shoot the shit and drink craft beers while country music plays too loudly over the speakers. After the first round, Claude starts to relax and stops thinking that this might have been a huge mistake. By the time Sid goes up to get a refill, Claude doesn't even tense when Wayne kicks him under the table and grins.

"What's that look for," Claude asks.

"What look?" Wayne says, spreading his hands. "I'm glad you're settling down. The line of twinks was kind of boring." At Claude affronted look, Wayne kicks him again. "Anyways, I bet he'll help you loosen up some." Wayne wiggles his eyebrows, and Claude groans.

"Yeah," Brayden interjects. "You've been kind of mopey."

"You can't just say that," Luke says, and then the conversation dissolves from Claude's _feelings_ to what the correct etiquette is for calling people mopey.

Claude stares at Sid's back up at the bar and can't help but feel guilty for a minute, that this is what Sid is getting into. Maybe it would be better if he could find someone normal to date, but Claude has never claimed not to be selfish. He's willing to give it a try, anyways. Maybe he'll surprise himself.

Sid stops drinking well before they have to go, so he's the one who drives them back to Claude's place.

"Did you forget where you live?" Claude asks, squinting at the familiar siding, the hideous gnomes peaking out of the snow.

"Well, if you'd said you wanted to go to my place I wouldn't have come here," Sid says, and Claude grins at how annoyed he sounds. He tips his head against the window and watches the few stars that are visible through the clouds. He's not actually that drunk, but it's nice to let his guard down.

Marlene pops into his head for a minute—what her version of kicking off a load was—but he pushes it away. It doesn't deserve any place here.

"There," Sid says as they pull into his garage. "Happy now?"

"Perfect," Claude says, and as soon as they're both inside he presses Sid up against his washing machine and kisses him.

"I thought you wanted to take things slow," Sid says as they're shucking their clothes, and Claude laughs against his mouth.

"I think it's a little late for that. I don't want to start over, I just want to know where we stand, do it properly if we're doing it." He pulls away to look Sid in the eye.

Sid looks determined, and combined with the flush in his cheeks it's making Claude hot. "Promise," he says, and Claude can't even make fun of him for how earnest he sounds before Sid's dipping his head down to nip against throat.

***

There are still things they don't talk about—Sid's injury, Claude's mother, anything having to do with money—but they work at it. It's not all that different from what they'd been doing before, but Claude doesn't tell Sid that. He's still a little leery of commitment, he can admit that to himself. But, it works. They work.

***

"So," Claude hears behind him in the cereal section. "I heard you're not with the library anymore?" He turns around from where he'd been debating between the gross Grape-Nuts that Sid likes and the forty types of Captain Crunch.

"Yes, that's right," he says and watches Bobbi's mom clap a hand over her mouth.

"Oh my god," she says. "I can't believe I just said that. That was so rude, I'm sorry."

"No," Claude says, "that's okay."

"Sorry, my husband's got the flu so he can't watch Bobbi, and she's been asking about you every time we've been at the library, and apparently I've lost all my social skills."

They end up standing in the aisle, blocking the Toasty O's, for half an hour talking, and when Claude leaves it's with an invitation over to her house for dinner once her husband's back on his feet. His life is still in somewhat of a free fall, but it's nice to keep being reminded that he's not alone in all of this.

He's picking up shifts at his old job with the hardware store now, but at least it's something. He thinks about the bedbugs he's missing, and smiles at nothing, standing in the middle of the aisle like an idiot. Maybe there's a silver lining after all.

***

He and Sid do the movie-and-dinner thing a couple of times, but honestly that's not really Claude's style. When he said that should do this properly, he mostly meant that they were on the same page about what was happening, not that they had to try and fill every rom-com trope ever produced.

They go back to Sid's house after leaving some artsy movie halfway through, and Claude flips through the channels on the TV in Sid's room. He stops on a hockey game on autopilot before realizing how much of an asshole that makes him.

"You don't have to change it for me," Sid says as Claude pats the covers for the remote, but he's staring at the TV a little too intently. Claude isn't really sure how hockey fits into Sid's life anymore now that he's not playing, besides helping out with various hockey clinics. Watching it must feel like something between pain and glory, he imagines. Some sort of bittersweet grief.

Sid still works out like he's training for something, but Claude's never seen him skate in person. Of course, the town doesn't have an ice rink and Sid's never around for winter, but still. That was his life for years. He's not sure he could ever understand, even if Sid tried to talk to him about it.

The Leafs turn the puck over, and Claude finally finds the remote and changes the channel.

"Who says I'm doing it for you?" he asks. "It's not like I can play now, either."

He can feel Sid staring at him, and Claude ignores him for a minute in favor of watching the ladies on QVC try and sell crockpots. Then he sighs and turns back towards him.

"I played in Juniors. The Olympiques."

"I didn't know that," Sid says, rolling over to peer at him.

Claude shrugs. "Yeah, well. I blew out my knee and there went that. It's not something you really bring up, is it? Especially compared to what you went through."

"That doesn't mean it matters less," Sid says, frowning at him, face washed out by the light coming from the TV.

Claude rolls his eyes. "Thanks for validating my emotions, Dr. Crosby."

Sid tries to hide his smile, this stupid quirk of his lips, and Claude knows he's going to get ribbed for this somehow. He can't even bring himself to feel bad about it if Sid's stopped looking at the TV like he's in physical pain. "Just think—"

Claude groans dramatically and smacks Sid with a pillow. "No! No thinking, no tidbits of hockey wisdom, no more talking. The date-date part is over. Suck my dick," he demands imperiously, regally pointing a finger at Sid who bites it none too gently.

"Jesus, fuck," Claude swears, the moment broken, and Sid has the audacity to laugh at him like the asshole he is. "Never mind, you're not getting anywhere near my dick."

"I'm just saying," Sid says, still smiling lopsidedly. "Think about what could have happened if we'd met earlier."

"I probably wasn't going to make the NHL," Claude says. "Too small."

Sid looks at him innocently. "I never said we'd meet in the _NHL_. Maybe outside the arena, trying to get me to autograph something."

"Asshole," Claude says, and resumes hitting Sid with the pillow until he stops laughing. It should probably be widely offensive, but so is Claude. "Go sleep on the couch."

"It's my house," Sid protests.

"I know," Claude says, scooting closer.

In the end, neither of them ends up getting a lot of sleep that night.

***

"So," the funeral assistant says, straightening her cuffs. "Our latest models are in the front, but if you would prefer cremation we have our sets of memorial urns over on this side, and—"

"Look," Claude cuts her off, "I can't actually pay for this. I don't want to pay for this." He really doesn't. But even though he can't bear to see Marlene, even though the smart thing to do would be to let someone else deal with her, he can't do that to his father. He'll bury her beside him—the plot is already there, her name is already engraved on his headstone, and he thinks that what his father would have wanted.

The funeral assistant nods. "We have a variety of payment plans, and I can show you our more affordable options."

"We're… estranged," Claude says, because it's easier than getting into the whole thing. He drags a hand over his face and says through it, "Just, whatever is cheapest. Like, pine coffin, whatever. No trappings. Cheap."

"Of course," the assistant says like this is common practice—like they have people coming in looking for the fastest way to get one chapter of their life over with. Hell, what does Claude know, maybe they do.

"Alright," Claude says, dropping his hand so he can clap them together. "You have anything in cardboard?"

The assistant looks like she's never heard of gallows humor before, but at least it's a distraction from all the sleek wood and satin pillows.

***

Claude isn't sleeping anymore, not really. He drives to the library one day on autopilot for his afternoon shift, and it's not until he's in the parking lot that he remembers he doesn't work there anymore.

He goes to the store instead since Sid is coming over for dinner later. He wanders around the aisles, doesn't have a list, doesn't have a plan, and winds up checking out with ravioli, grapefruit, a variety of things in cans, frozen dinners, and knock-off Oreos.

He can't stop thinking about Marlene. It's like picking out the coffin sparked something inside Claude and he's second-guessing every choice he's made about her. There's a reason they're estranged, but dead is dead, right? Shouldn't he at least try again, one final time? Doesn't it make him a coward if he doesn't try?

He knows that he should go home, that it's over, that she's probably not even coherent anymore. He hadn't wanted to know that details, but maybe that was a mistake. When Claude starts driving, he doesn't even pretend he's not going to the hospital.

He can't make it inside.

He sits in the parking lot and tries to convince himself to get out of the car. His groceries are thawing in the trunk and he should just get this over with and go home. He gets as far as taking off his seatbelt before he stalls out again, both hands on the steering wheel.

The car is off, it's in park, the windows are up, and there's nothing keeping him here. He can get out. He can go in. He can see his mother before it's too late.

He still can't get out of the car, though.

He shouldn't be here. He shouldn't be in charge of this. It's been years and he thought it was done, everything with Marlene, like he could just put it away in a dusty corner of his mind. He doesn't want this burden of forgiveness. He doesn't care if he's being selfish.

Someone pushing a wheelchair for an elderly lady with white hair exits the hospital, and then a woman who could be her daughter comes and starts loading her into a van, and all Claude can do is stare.

That could have been him and his mother, never mind the age difference. If things had gone differently and she weren't an addict who cared more about herself than anything else, that could have been them.

He doesn't know why that's it, why that's the catalyst, but it is. It's like everything he's been telling himself is okay, all this time, just crumbles. He sits in his shitty life, in his shitty car, in the shitty parking lot of the hospital, and cries. Not quiet tears, but the type where he can't stop his shoulders from shaking, breath shivering out in hitching sobs, and if he can't get himself under control he's going to start hiccuping.

It feels like drowning, Claude thinks. Or like he's been launched into space. Doesn't time go slower when things are moving at the speed of light? That's what this feels like, like Claude is stretched thin and sailing through the ether, like he's never going to be able to stop.

By the time he's pulled himself together, it's ten minutes past when he was supposed to stick the ravioli casserole in the oven. He feels hollowed out and numb, and for one minute he looks at the sliding doors and can almost envision walking through them, following the signs to the right wing, walking into Marlene's room. And then he fumbles on his seatbelt and drives home.

Claude's leaning against the counter staring off into space, waiting for the oven to preheat, when Sid knocks.

"It's unlocked," he calls after clearing his throat, and hears Sid kicking his shoes off into the messy pile of the boys' sneakers. He'd been going to clean the place up a bit but he'd used up all his energy on making dinner, and the boys aren't going to be home for hours so he can't ask them for help.

Sid pads into the kitchen, but Claude doesn't look up from ripping the label off a can of olives. His eyes are still red, face puffy from crying so hard, and he doesn't want Sid to see him like that. He'd tried putting a cold washcloth over his face, but it'd just left him feeling soggy.

"Sorry," Claude says. "Dinner's going to be late, I'm really behind schedule." He can't figure out why the can opener isn't working, and stands there spinning the gears for a minute before Sid takes it out of his hands.

"It's fine. Are you okay?" he asks, tipping Claude's face towards him. Claude meets his gaze for a second before twisting away.

"I'm fine," Claude says, and it almost doesn't feel like a lie.

"Okay," Sid says after a pause. "How about I finish this up and you take a break?"

"I can do it, I'm not an invalid," Claude says, but the words feel mechanical. He's so tired all of a sudden, and now Sid won't even sit down and let him finish garnishing the goddamn casserole.

"I know you can," Sid says, and Claude would snap at him, but there's nothing pitying in his voice. He sounds matter-of-fact, like he doesn't know that Claude's a mess and a terrible person and that his life is in shambles.

When Sid puts his hand on Claude's shoulder and steers him out of the room, he doesn't fight.

"Just go lie down," Sid says. "I'm more than capable of making dinner," because even now he can't resist being bossy. Before Claude can say anything to that effect, he's sitting on his bed and Sid is shaking out the quilt Claude had appropriated from Danny.

"I'm not taking a nap," Claude protests. "This is stupid."

Sid hums. "I'll come and get you when everything's ready, okay? Just close your eyes."

"You don't know the recipe," Claude says, but he does what he's told. He'll just rest his eyes for a minute. Just a minute.

When he wakes up, Claude is groggy, his head feels like someone ran over it a couple of times, and his eyes are dry. Sid is nowhere in sight, but there's a glass of water on the side table. The clock shows that dinnertime has long passed.

Still, Claude feels calmer now, or maybe that's not the right word. He feels more removed from the situation, at least. Less likely to start screaming and never stop.

He takes the water and the aspirin he finds sitting next to it. He should get up and go apologize to Sid for ruining their evening, if he's even still here. He can hear the faint sounds of music coming from one of the boy's rooms, but Claude takes a moment to breathe without the chaos of everything else around him. Then he folds the quilt at the end of the bed and goes to see if Sid is still around.

He finds him sitting at the table, filling in the crossword. Danny's going to be pissed.

"Hey," Sid says, looking up when Claude leans against the counter. "You're up."

The stove's been turned off and the beans are sitting on a burner besides the ravioli casserole. Everything looks cooked, so Sid was right about his culinary skills, but it's all stone-cold. Claude knows that even without having to reach out and touch them.

"Here," Sid says, getting up and opening the refrigerator. He pulls out the sparkling cider he must have brought with him and puts it on the counter, and if Claude wasn't such a disaster then this would have been a really great meal. "I put the bread in for the boys since it was sitting out, but you've got crescent rolls we could make if you still want bread? It'll just take like ten minutes to make."

"I'm sorry," Claude says. Sid stops and looks up from the back of the can of crescent rolls. "You didn't sign up for any of my shit, and I just keep dragging you into it."

"It's fine," Sid says, but it isn't. Claude knows it isn't. Sid wants routine and uncomplicated. He wants traveling carnivals and walks through the nature trails and Claude in his bed, not whatever Claude's been doing lately. He doesn't know how to say any of that, though, not and have Sid listen to him.

"Let me make it up to you," Claude says, slinking across the room in a way he hopes is sexy, but probably just looks like he's forgotten how to walk.

Sid looks disquieted. "You don't owe me anything," he says and keeps holding the can of dough in front of him like it's a shield.

"I know I don't," Claude says. He should start unbuttoning his shirt or something, but his hands hang at his sides. He feels groggy and uncoordinated, and he wishes he could just start this day over. Maybe this year.

"Claude, just sit," Sid sighs. "If I didn't want to be here, I could just go."

Claude shrug and sits down. Sid puts a glass of sparkling cider in front of him, even though what Claude really wants is wine. Maybe some of the whiskey Danny keeps in the upper cabinet. It would be a bad idea right now, but that doesn't stop him from wanting it.

"After the hit," Sid says suddenly, and Claude looks up from where he'd been tracing condensation from his glass across the vinyl tablecloth. Sid doesn't talk about his time in the league, not really, and Claude's never heard him talk about the last hit in a string of head injuries. "I pushed a lot of people away when I realized it was for good. That it was all over."

"I'm sorry," Claude says quietly. He wants to reach out and put a hand on Sid's shoulder, but Sid is leaning against the counter. Even if he was closer, Claude's not sure it would be welcome.

Sid swallows, but there's something determined in his eyes. "I know it's not the same, not even close, but you don't have to be sorry. Just try not to be an asshole like me who couldn't accept help."

Claude squints at him. "Did you just call me an asshole?"

Sid looks stubborn. "No, I'm calling you hurting. It doesn't matter that you're estranged," he says when Claude opens his mouth. "I can't imagine how stressful this all is."

"Thanks," Claude says after a long minute.

Sid nods, and that's that. Claude stays at the table while Sid microwaves their food in eighty-eight second intervals and watches him move around the kitchen like he belongs there. Sid takes the seat next to him when Claude pushes it out with his foot.

Halfway through the meal Claude grabs Sid's hand with his free hand, and they eat reheated ravioli casserole under the ladybugs bouncing off the kitchen light. Sid doesn't even complain about having to use his left hand.

***

"So," Cameron says, sticking his tongue out of the corner of his mouth. "If this connects here, then that means this piece must go…"

He sticks the styrofoam ball to a colored straw from the pack of a hundred that Claude had found in the cabinet on the top shelf where they keep the plates they never use. Cameron consults his diagram again. Claude accidentally glues the piece of paper that's supposed to go on a toothpick like a flag to his finger instead.

"Claude," Cameron says. "You're supposed to be putting the markers together, not to yourself."

"Just fit me in the display, I'd make a good Saturn," Claude tells him, waving his finger around as he holds the Neptune label on its toothpick with his other hand.

"Because you're a gas giant?" Cameron asks, and Claude is almost proud of that insult.

"Watch who you're calling a gas giant."

He sees the gleam in Cameron's eye right before he grabs the remaining labels and darts out of the room. Claude could go stop him from trying that insult out on everyone else, but he looks at the solar system, listing slightly to the side, and grins. He can hear Danny upstairs trying to corral the boys, even if he can't make out exactly what he's saying. There's a lot of laughter, though.

Claude prods the solar system, then digs through the bag of unused straws until he's got a red one and goes to pours himself a glass of milk.

***

Sid has the idea for an indoor picnic, and Claude thinks it's probably the dumbest thing he's ever heard, but he isn't going to tell Sid that. It's like he gets all of his ideas from some bad country living magazine, and it's verging between painful and painfully cute.

Claude spreads a blanket on the living room floor, kicking one of Caelan's shoes out of the way as he does. Sid sticks the food on the coffee table and then starts looking through Claude's CD collection.

"Do you have anything that's not country?" he asks.

"Try Danny's side," Claude tells him, pointing. Sid flips through that for a while, so Claude gives up and starts unwrapping the sandwiches.

"Why don't you guys own anything good?" Sid complains, but he's got a CD in his hand so it can't all be bad.

"Stick it in the player then, otherwise I'm going to eat all of your potato salad."

Sid does as he's told, or at least he tries to. Claude starts laughing as the wooden figurine on top of the player topples off, and Sid juggles it while holding the CD for a long minute before the figurine lands on the rug.

"You should audition for a sitcom or something," Claude gets out, wheezing slightly as he does. "God, that was hilarious."

"Here, come show me how it works," Sid says.

Claude pushes himself up off the floor and leaves his sandwich on the coffee table. "Okay, you see this—"

Sid interrupts his explanation by tackling him backwards onto the couch, which makes an ominous creaking sound.

"Oh my god. Crosby, you lunatic, let me up," Claude says. His stomach is starting to hurt from laughing so hard, but he can't help it. "What happened to your picnic, Sid of Green Gables?"

"Which one of us is ginger? And shut up, I already know you think it's stupid."

"Kind of," Claude grins up at him. His phone starts vibrating on the coffee table, and he almost doesn't pick up.

"Do you need to take that?" Sid asks. His face is very close and Claude really should have gotten one of the boys to install ringtones, but that's a task for later.

"Here, just—" he waves a hand at Sid to get off him and grabs his phone without looking to see who's calling.

"Hello, this is Claude," he says, slightly breathless, and rolls his eyes at the way Sid sprawls out on the couch.

"This is the Teresa Standish Memorial Hospital," he hears, and the world fades at the edges. The conversation passes in a blur, and then Claude is saying, "No, thank you, that’s—thanks," and it's over.

It's over.

He hangs up and just stares at the blank screen of his phone for a minute before Sid shifts towards him.

"Everything okay?" he asks, sliding a hand down Claude's back, and Claude suddenly has to get out of here. He shakes Sid's hand off and turns, and whatever is in his face must be bad if Sid's looking at him like that.

"My mother just—" he stutters. "She—I," he pauses here and closes his eyes, shuts out the living room windows leaking sunlight and the concerned tilt of Sid's mouth. He lets himself have the darkness for a moment, just a moment, before he clears his throat and says, as clearly as he's able, "I need to go to the hospital."

He can hear Sid moving around, and Claude clutches his phone tighter. Sid's probably putting the food away now that their date is over. He wonders distantly who's going to eat the sandwich he'd taken a bite of, or if Sid's just going to toss it.

"I should, keys," he says and stands up. The room is oddly bright now, and Claude can't figure out how to get everything working right again. He knew this day was coming, had prayed for it in his darker moments, despite how horrible that makes him. He's not sure why it's all hitting him so hard now.

There's a light touch on his elbow. "Where do you keep your keys?" Sid asks, voice even and gentle, like this is a perfectly normal question to be asking. Claude gestures vaguely towards the kitchen, and Sid pads out of the room, still in socks.

Claude sits back down, then decides that he should probably put some shoes on.

By the time he's rounded up everything, Sid's come back with the keys. He's shrugging into a jacket and holds out one of Danny's from the hooks in the entranceway. "Come on," he says, and Claude glares at him.

"Don't kick me out of my own house," he snaps, frustrated. He makes a grab for the keys, but Sid pulls his hand away.

"We're taking my car. I'm driving," Sid says, and there's no arguing with his tone. Claude stares at him for a minute, trying to get his brain to rearrange the picture, and Sid holds out Danny's jacket to help him put it on, like he's a kid who can't dress himself.

Claude lets him, because he doesn't know what else to do.

"You don't have to do this," he says, fumbling the buttons and grabbing his wallet off the kitchen counter. "You should, I'm sorry. You can just—"

"Claude," Sid interrupts. "Let me drive. I want to."

"Fine," Claude says. "Fine," and they go.

He calls Danny on the way there and leaves a message for Wayne who will tell the Schenns. That's about it, his circle of friends, and he's got no one to call for Marlene. Sid drives with even precision, and soon enough they're pulling into the lot.

Claude talks to her doctor. Claude goes to the bathroom and clings to the sink like it's a lifeline. Claude stands outside the room and doesn't look at her body.

Sid hangs out in the waiting room and doesn't leave. Of course he's Claude's ride, but Danny showed up a while ago and Claude could easily drive back with him.

Beyond the suffocating exhaustion, Claude watches Sid play some card game with Danny's boys, and doesn't even call Caelan on it when he cheats outrageously. Claude leans up against the wall and closes his eyes.

"Take him home," Danny's telling Sid, quiet like Claude can't hear them.

"I'm right here," Claude says, tossing a bag of chips from the vending machine at Danny. "And I'm fine." He scrubs a hand through his hair. "We weren't close," he tells Sid, for what feels like the thousandth time, "and it's been coming for a while."

"How much sleep did you get last night?" Danny asks, tossing the chips back. Claude fumbles them a second too late, and they hit the floor. Danny raises an eyebrow like that answers his question.

Claude opens his mouth to blame Sid, but Danny cuts him off.

"I've got this under control," he tells Claude. voice gentler than before. "You don't have to do this. Let me make the arrangements for you." Claude can feel his eyes begin to burn, and it's so stupid.

Danny wraps him up in a hug—a real one, not any of that one-armed back-clapping—and Claude allows himself this moment. Danny's bony and holds on too hard, but Claude clings back. He scrubs a hand through Claude's hair when he's done.

"I'll see you later," Danny tells him, and then Sid's steering them out of the hospital, away from the fluorescents and all the white surfaces and the smell of disinfectant.

He looks like he wants to do up Claude's seatbelt for him but is refraining himself, and Claude shuts his own car door before Sid can do that for him. He turns the radio on when Sid starts the car, and the same overplayed pop songs he's been hearing for a month come tumbling out. It disconcerting—the normalcy overlaying this weird headspace—and maybe that's why Claude doesn't notice they've missed his turnoff.

"This isn't my house," Claude says when they pull into Sid's drive. "I don't—" he turns and looks at Sid, who's already turned the car off but hasn't gotten out yet. "You don't have to baby me," Claude tells him.

"Who says I am?" Sid asks as he gets out.

"…I do?" Claude tells the empty car. If Sid comes around and gets his door they're going to have a problem, but Sid doesn't. He leans against the front of the car, back to Claude, giving him space.

Claude sits there like an idiot for a minute before unbuckling his seatbelt. He doesn't get out, though. Every move he makes feels like he's being pulled down by something larger than himself. If he lets himself, he'll just sit there in the car and not do anything till the sun rises and he has to get his life together.

Claude could get Sid to take him back to his house, if that's what he really wanted. Or drive him back to the hospital. Or come back in and sit with him. Hell, if Claude decided to stay in the car for the rest of the night, Sid would probably keep sitting there in the dark and the cool while Claude lost his shit.

Claude gets out before he can test his hypothesis. He comes around to the front of the car and perches on the bumper by Sid. He can feel the heat of the metal, and he's probably crushing bugs into his pants, but he doesn't care.

It feels like an eternity ago that he was at home, big plans for the evening. He can't remember what they were now, but he knows he had them.

"We lived in this yellow house when I was little," he says, voice hoarse. He looks straight ahead, and it's almost like they're still in the car, both of them facing forward, side-by-side. "She had this garden out front, just this little patch of pink flowers that was always creeping across the border and into the yard. One year she ripped it all up because she wanted to put something else there, I forget what. Tulips or something. And she put some of the flowers in pots and would sing to them each morning. The Beatles, usually."

He stops there, finds that he can't continue the story, not how she'd stand him on the sink and let him water them himself. Not Marlene and her drugs. Not Child Protective Services and all the drama. All the fucking drama. He wants her in that yellow house, just as it was, but people aren't static. He can't have one part of her without the other.

"Isn't that stupid? To remember something like that?" Claude asks, looking over at Sid like he'll have the answer. Like he can help fit these two halves together—Marlene and his mother, her care and her indifference. "I just—" Claude looks forward again, stares at the side of Sid's house until his eyes stop burning.

He feels Sid's hand cover his own, and turns his palm so he can link their fingers together. Sid squeezes his hand. He doesn't say anything, and Claude gets that. There's not much to say.

They sit there until the security light times out, and Claude knows he's holding on too tightly, that he must be hurting him, but Sid just stays there, steady at his side, and lets him.

***

Claude wakes up to the smell of coffee, and it takes him a long minute before the events of the past day come together in his mind. Sid's migraine curtains are down so it's still dark in the room, but the clock is reading half-past ten.

Sid's standing in the kitchen scrapping eggs onto a plate when Claude walks in. There's a whole array of foods on a tray, like he thinks Claude's going to forget how to eat.

"Hey, you're up." he says when he spots him. Claude's still wearing the sweats that Sid had pulled out for him. "How are you feeling?" He looks like he regrets saying that as soon as the words are out.

"I'm okay," Claude says, and it isn't a lie. "You trying to showcase your culinary talents?" He leans against the counter and picks up a piece of toast, and Sid lets him change the subject.

"There's a plate for a reason," he complains, and Claude sticks a hand under his mouth to catch any crumbs. They eat like that, standing up in the middle of Sid's too-large kitchen while the birds sing outside. The orange juice has pulp and the eggs are a little rubbery, but Claude thinks this is as close to perfect as he could ask for.

"Thanks," Claude says after they're done and the dishes are in the sink. He trusts that Sid knows he's not just talking about breakfast. "I should be going, make sure the viewing's all set."

"Sure," Sid says, and they drive back to Claude's house with the radio playing softly.

When Claude gets out of the car, Sid does too and comes around to his side. He hovers awkwardly there in the drive like he's thinking about going in for a kiss, but he pulls Claude in for a hug instead. He's solid and warm, and if Claude clings, well. Sid doesn't pull away.

"Come by later?" Claude asks when he finally steps back, and Sid nods.

"I will," he promises, and Claude turns around and walks inside before he loses his nerve and convinces Sid to stay.

***

Danny had scheduled the viewing and funeral for as soon as possible. Claude has a suspicion that Sid is going to pay for it behind his back somehow, but he doesn't want to fight about it right now. He has no idea how he's going to pay for everything as it is. Marlene had burned just about every bridge she'd ever built, but he wants to do this right so he can close this chapter in his life and finally move on.

He lays out the tie he's going to wear, picked from Danny's collection, and roots through the closet until he finds his suit. It's hidden at the very back, shoved behind the flannel and the sheepskin-lined jacket with the 70's color pattern, and the hanger is covered by a garbage bag.

It's like unearthing a part of himself Claude thought he'd left behind when he pulls it out. He'd had gotten it after he'd graduated high school and was still working on his bachelor's, high hopes for the future. The jacket has long since been outgrown and replaced but not the pants, which were just a little too long to begin with—he'd found the suit on sale and still though he'd get it altered one day.

Downstairs, the boys are getting ready, and Claude stands at the top of the stairs and listens to the familiar cadence of their voices before joining them. Carson is wearing one of Danny's suit jackets, the same one he'd worn last year as part of his scarecrow costume for Halloween. It hangs off him, even with the sleeves rolled.

Cameron and Danny are arguing about shoes. Apparently Cameron's old loafers pinch his feet so he wants to wear his black tennis shoes, but Danny's having none of it.

"You wore them just last month," he's saying, exasperated. "When you went to that church group with Dave. They fit fine then."

"I've grown since then," Cameron whines. Claude leaves them to their test of wills and goes to help Caelan with his tie.

***

The casket is wood, unadorned. There are more people there than Claude was expecting, but the crowd is still incredibly small. The chairs up at the front of the room just seem to magnify Marlene's lack of friends. Someone over by the guest book is writing something down, but Claude doesn't want to see it. Doesn't want to know what they're saying, or who they are, or whatever memories or false condolences they're inking in the giant book. Claude doesn't want any of it.

Maybe he should be up at the front by the casket, but he literally can't do that. If people want to come over and shake his hand and tell him how sorry they are for his loss, that's their problem, not Claude's.

The boys are in the back, looking too small in their large suits. Danny had lost the footwear battle with Cameron, so he's wearing his tennis shoes. Claude has to admit that it doesn't look terrible on him, not at a glance, and Carson has his phone out and is discretely playing some game judging by the look of concentration on his face.

"You good?" Danny asks, voice pitched low. Up near the front of the room the funeral director is shaking someone's hand, saying something in a soothing voice while another woman blows her nose with a kleenex. Claude's never seen her before in his life.

"Yeah," Claude says, and he is. He feels removed from the scene, in an odd way, like he's just left his body for a minute and will be coming back to it later, but he feels okay. For all the time he spent waiting for this to happen, for everything to start changing, it's over now. It feels freeing, in a way.

"Yeah," Claude says again, and reaches out to squeeze Danny's hand. There's a commotion about a bee buzzing around one of the bunches of flowers the funeral home had provided, and then someone's trying to catch the thing in a plastic cup while someone else rolls up a pamphlet and tries to kill it.

"Looks like I got here just in time," Claude hears, and he knows before he even turns around, probably could have know just by the way that the air moved, that Sid's there.

He turns around, and Sid's wearing something nice, but not too nice, and his tie catches the color of his eyes.

"Come on," Claude says, ignoring the chaos happening at the front of the room. "Danny's got it. Let's get out of here."

They don't go far, just out the door and around the side of the building. The sun is setting, and their shadows are thrown in front of them as they walk down the path to a stream with a wooden bridge. The trees are still bare, but the weather is nice and Claude can see little blue flowers blooming in the grass.

They don't talk, but the silence is companionable. There isn't anything that's been left unsaid, Claude thinks, or if there is he's left it behind in the stifling oppression of all the well-wishers. Claude walks forward until he's at the edge of the bridge and stands at the railing, hands dangling into the expanse of space before the water. They linger as the sun sinks lower, the light glittering off the ripples in the stream.

Sid touches him on the arm, gently, and points. There, flitting through the air above them, is a pair of goldfinches. They alight on a tree before flying off, and Claude loses sight of them.

Sid stands next to him as the evening closes in, and when Sid puts his hand over Claude's, he laces their fingers together. They hold hands in the gathering dusk, and Claude breathes for what feels like the first time in an eternity.

The air is damp, but his knee hasn't started hurting yet. He tightens his grip, and Sid squeezes back.

"So, you uh," Claude's voice breaks, and he clears his throat. "You come here often?"

Sid huffs out a laugh and bumps their shoulders together. "I'm thinking I might." He turns then, still keeping ahold of Claude's hand. "Come with me." He looks nervous, but the set of his jaw is determined. "I promised a friend I'd help out with a hockey clinic, but you should come with me. I know it's crazy and you've got a life, but you could get out of here. We could go anywhere. We could see the sights. Maybe we'd drive each other crazy, but—"

"Yes," Claude says, without even having to hear the rest. Claude smiles, and he can feel how wobbly it is, but it's there. It's real. "C'mon Crosby, let's go see the country together. Thought you'd never ask."

Maybe this is a terrible idea. They'll probably kill each other before they even make it out of the state, and Claude doesn't have any money, and everyone will say he's gone crazy. He'll miss the boys and Danny and his friends, and there's no guarantee that he and Sid last. Claude can almost hear the popping of the engine, their raised voices over the desert on their way out west, feel the heat pressing down and smothering him, but.

But.

This town was never where he was supposed to end up. Claude thinks back to Danny telling him he has options, but that's not why he wants to do this. He looks at Sid and he can almost taste the sky. He looks at Sid and he can almost see home.

Maybe they don't last, and maybe it all goes to shit, but Claude's not giving up without a fight. He wants Sid. He wants to give this a shot.

The future lingers outside the bubble they've constructed for themselves, inevitable and inescapable, but when Claude kisses Sid on the bridge behind the funeral home it's enough. For now, it's enough.

**Author's Note:**

> There is also a [playlist](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL47mdscZ5in8uJCpZum75euymIiDAmnMy) for this story, made by yours truly.
> 
> Come yell about things with me on [tumblr!](https://enter-remiges.tumblr.com/)


End file.
